If one imagines a grand dinner party, then among the most extravagant dishes there would be the likes of caviar, truffles, oysters, and, of course, lobster. This expensive delicacy, normally associated with high prices, was once referred to as the "cockroach of the ocean." You’ll be surprised to know that before lobster became so expensive and out of the reach of the common man, people did not have to pay to eat it.
‘Protein of the bad man’
In Maine, there were so many lobsters that they covered the beaches and became a common meal. Colonizers used the seafood as nourishment for crops and fish, but they didn't eat it anymore. In the 1800s, crustaceans such as lobsters were inexpensive and were therefore nicknamed "the protein of the bad man" until certain eateries began serving them in the 1980s.
Lobsters were so abundant in the Massachusetts Bay that they would pile up into two-foot-high heaps. They were considered trash food and were only served to servants or prisoners. In 1622, William Bradford, who was governor of Plymouth Plantation, was mortified when he admitted to new colonists that the only food they had "to offer their friends" was a lobster and a cup of water. Some in Massachusetts revolted after hearing this and forced the colony to sign indentured servant contracts prohibiting them from eating lobster more than three times a week.
Lobster: So cheap that it was used as pet food
In 1876, lobster shells around a house were considered signs of poverty and degradation. According to reports, a lobster was a strange and slightly unpleasant sea creature that resembled an insect. Although lobster was eaten by some, it was rarely eaten for pleasure and wasn’t eaten publicly. When the price of Boston baked beans was 53 cents a pound in the 19th century, lobster sold for 11 cents a pound and was so cheap that people would feed their pets with it.
Lobsters: used as prisoners’ food
Due to the fact that lobsters in those days were huge, they were fed to prisoners as a cheap source of energy. Despite the fact that authorities tried to stop the practice, eating lobsters was still cheap. Some Massachusetts servants even included lobster feeding in their contracts.
From abhorrence to prime business, the unlikely tale of the lobster's rise begins long before the colonists arrived. Local American tribes along the Atlantic ground lobsters into fertilizer and bait for fishing, as well as cooking them on pink rocks piled on the beach.
Rise of lobster
So how did lobster become a luxury item in the world? In the early days, lobster was very common; it was cheap and nutritious food and was served to servants and prisoners. In the 1800s, Maine was dotted with lobster canneries, and the lobsters were really huge back then. The factories did not want to work with small lobsters and considered 4 or 5-pound lobsters too small for canning. But they were processing lobsters at such a high speed that they soon started dealing with smaller lobsters as well.
Train transportation managers realized that they could serve lobster to passengers as if it were a rare, exotic item, even though it was very cheap for those operating the railroad. Inland passengers were intrigued by the lobster, which was delicious. After leaving the train, passengers who did not know lobster was a coastal trash food started to enjoy it and ask for it. It became a popular food. By the 1880s, chefs recognized that lobster was better and looked nicer when cooked live rather than killed beforehand.
Americans began to like lobster, and so they demanded more of it. As a result, fishermen noticed that there were fewer lobsters, raising the price. In the 1920s, lobster prices peaked, but when the Great Depression came in 1929, the lobster market fell, and impoverished families in Maine would go to the ocean in the dark to reset their lobster traps and eat the day’s catch to save their families from starvation. It was still seen, at least in Maine, as food for the poor. It was regarded as embarrassing for children to have to go to school with lunches made of lobster meat. No one could afford lobster in restaurants, so the lobster was sent back to the canneries to provide cheap protein for American military troops.
However, in World War II, lobster wasn't rationed like other foods, and so people of all classes started to consume it in great numbers and discover its deliciousness. By the 1950s, lobster had become a delicacy, and movie stars ate it when they went out for dinner. Young, rich people ordered lobster for their weddings, and the Rockefellers served it at their parties.
The boom of cities, especially New York and Boston, led Maine lobsters to be easily shipped there, thus helping lobsters become a popular food in the late 19th century. Maine played an important role in this development. The first lobster farm opened in Vinalhaven, a small fishing community, at the same time as commercial fishing in Maine began to flourish. People from all over the United States subsequently learned to respect the lobster.