Lobster

I picked up one lobster to try and it was pretty awful.There's very little eating in it basically a snack for two.Mine was watery tasting and very rubbery as it was overcooked.Glad I didn't buy any more! Much better value to buy large prawns either king or tiger and make a nice sauce

If it's only a little bit of lobster, remove the meat and boil the shells with some tarragon and capers. Strain and use 50% to boil some linguine or other pasta. In a separate pot sweat a finely chopped clove of garlic, about 1/2 or 1 shallot (to taste) in a smll amount of olive oil. Add a drizzle of cream or creme fraiche and mix in the lobster meat, the remaining stock, a bay leaf and whatever veg you fancy (wild mushroom mix, peas, handful of herbs, spinach, rocket, celery, celeriac, carrot all work). Drain pasta, stir in sauce (removing bay leaf) and serve. The vast majority of the above ingredients can be bought in Lidl too.

Thanks for all your suggestions.

The lobster is not worth buying. But we had a delicious dinner after the village firework display.

I did make a risotto, I boiled the shell to make stock. There was only about 100 grams of meat, so I bought some fresh Tiger Prawns from Morrisons (£1.99). Added a few peas and some fennel. The wine I used was delicious, from a hugely discounted mixed case from Tesco Direct (free delivery too!) Along with a rocket salad, and a beautiful unpasteurised cheese for dessert (reduced to half price last week, and allowed to ripen), we ate like Kings and had a lovely evening.

I bought a frozen lobster last Christmas from Aldi - I was not impressed. You need at least a whole one per person. After defrosting, the lobster meat was rather watery. IMHO it was not worth the money. Fresh lobster is far better, if you can get it.

Try fresh British crab, it is lovely and easier to prepare than you might imagine and there is far more meat and crab paste than you would get off one of these frozen lobsters from Lidl/Aldi.

If it's frozen, use it for cooking with rather than cold with mayo. You can make a nice pasta sauce with a bit of cream, onion, lobster, white wine and a sprinkle of parmesan, or try lobster thermidor (a bit heavy IMO) TBH, I wouldn't eat any pre-cooked lobster plain & cold, but make sure you re-heat it thoroughly.

If they're raw, then you need to cook them. There are a number of ways to do this, and opinion differs. The RSPCA say put them in cold water and bring very slowly to the boil - I've tried this, and if you do it too fast, it's unpleasant as they get lively, so it has to be VERY slowly. Or you can chuck them in water that's already boiling hard. Or you can kill them (skewer through the head), cut them up (don't be alarmed if they move, the nerves twitch for a bit) and grill them.

For an average-sized lobster the chuck in boiling water version takes about 15 minutes.