Thread: Lobster Butter, The Icedog Method

Remove the butter pot from the oven to the stovetop. Pour the boiling water over the butter until water is about two inches from the top of the pot. Gently stir the water/butter to free up the shells so they can sink. They all won’t sink but we’ll fix those floaters later.

Carefully (so you don’t splash boiling water and hot butter all over the place) put the pot into a cooler that has enough iced water to rise to the level of the contents of the pot but not so much that it will flood into the pot. Cover the pot and shut the cooler.

After an hour or so you will find the air in the cooler has become quite warm and the pot has cooled off. Carefully lift the pot from the cooler and put it in the refrigerator overnight. In the morning you’ll find the magic has happened! The shells have sunk to the bottom and the butter has floated to the surface.

Look at that color! Smell the richness of the butter! Slide a thin blade (I use a cake spatula) around the perimeter separating the butter from the pot.

Here is the stuff for which you’ve been working so hard, a nice tasty slug of bright orange butter.

You’ll notice there are still a lot of shell bits and other things we don’t want to discuss, much less eat in there so break up the slug and put it in a saucepan over low heat.

Once it has melted again, pour it through a fine sieve. This is now useable lobster butter. You can freeze it and it will keep forever. Be bold, experiment, have fun!

By the end of this week I will post a recipe that calls for the use of lobster butter. But in the meantime, if you have any questions, please feel free to ask me.

Brad