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AUGUSTA – Grilled lobster-stuffed crepes served with baby shrimp hollandaise and fresh blueberry and blackberry compote.
Lobster tail with savory potato flapjacks and caramelized shallot cream sauce. Lobster and asparagus strata.
That’s just a sampling of the servings that pleased palates Thursday at the governor’s mansion, as nine chefs went toque-to-toque in the seventh annual governor’s Great Taste of Maine Lobster Tasting.
Themes of some past competitions have been appetizers, soups and low-fat dishes – all, of course, featuring Maine’s celebrated crustacean. This year’s challenge: lobster brunch.
The dishes served up in the latest taste test aren’t what you’d find at your ordinary lobster bake.
Chefs in starched white suits took turns in the Blaine House kitchen working up creations to be sampled by a three-judge panel choosing winners of gold, silver and bronze medals and the “People’s Choice” award.
Gov. Angus King and first lady Mary Herman were the guests of honor, but did not judge the entries.
Nate Beriau, chef de cuisine at Portland’s Perfetto restaurant, whipped up what he described as a spinoff of French toast. Generous slabs of lobster tail are stacked between slices of French bread and coated with an orange marmalade-maple syrup mix.
The plate was topped by a shelled lobster claw and crisscrossed by sweet orange slices.
Where did Beriau come up with such an idea?
“I don’t know, really,” said the finalist in the Maine Lobster Promotion Council’s 1998 and 2000 competitions. “They said lobster for brunch and I started putting flavors together.”
University of Maine specialty Chef Glenn Taylor worked up a lobster mousse and egg strudel with cranberry and apple chutney.
Preparing meals for special events at UMaine, Taylor is accustomed to using Maine-grown foods. One of his specialties is a salmon mousse with cucumber or dill sauce.
“So I said, ‘Let’s do a lobster mousse,”‘ said Taylor, who was entering the event for the first time. “It just hit me.”
Taylor and other chefs said they don’t mind sharing their recipes, and are even flattered when others copy their dishes. Taylor said the Blaine House event gives him a chance to swap culinary ideas with other chefs.
Chefs at the annual competition, which marks Maine’s Lobster Promotion Month, seemed to take the contest in stride. Aside from a few damp brows near the governor’s oven, they stayed cool under the pressure.
Bates College Chef James Byron, who studied in Europe, is used to cooking for the president of the Lewiston college and its distinguished visitors. On Thursday, Byron’s third-place entry was the lobster-stuffed crepes creation, based on an idea “that just came to me one night.”
Like other lobster-cooking chefs, Byron asks other cooks, friends and relatives to test his dishes before he declares them official recipes – and often they offer useful advice.
Byron, who has created hundreds of recipes, accepted a suggestion that the hollandaise not be poured on top of the crepe, but rather inside it so it doesn’t detract from the looks of his lobster-shaped specialty.
After all, the entries are judged not only on flavor, nutritional value and how contemporary they are, but on their presentation, color and overall appeal.
Thursday’s winner, who gets $500 along with the medal and bragging rights as Maine Lobster Chef of the Year, was John Welsh of the Castine Inn. Welsh served lobster on herbed brioche, with organic greens, shellfish glaze and a sherry vinaigrette
Second place was William Hynes, chef at the Spruce Point Inn, and the “People’s Choice” award went to Tony Frechette of Cafe Stroudwater in Portland.
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