Two is too many. Three is unpalatable. But one and a half, as many lobster lovers know, is just right. Boiled for 12 to 14 minutes, the chicken lobster, as it is called, is a delicacy unmatched in Maine cooking.

“I’ve eaten two-pounders,” said Ana Patuelia Ortins, author of “Portuguese Homestyle Cooking.” “I don’t like them. I once ate a three-pounder. I didn’t like it either. I don’t want my lobster to be overcooked or rubbery. I want it to be tender. Cooked, but not too firm.”

Ortins is one of four cookbook authors who will share lobster preparation techniques during a series of four Wednesday cooking seminars in July at the Penobscot Marine Museum in Searsport. The classes are being held in conjunction with “Lobstah: From Bait to Plate,” a show devoted entirely to Maine’s best-loved shellfish. While the exhibition, which runs through Oct. 17, features folk art, photos and a human-size interactive lobster trap in which patrons can experience being caught, the hourlong cooking classes feature the crustacean in its most popular setting: on a plate.

Ortins, who has a home in Harspwell, will share her technique for boiled lobster, but she will also prepare clams cataplana, a dish prepared with a seasoned broth in a Portuguese cooking vessel.

“There aren’t a lot of lobster recipes in Portugal,” said Ortins, whose class is July 14. “When we do boil lobster, we mash garlic, salt and hot pepper with it. Most people don’t know the flavors of Portuguese food, unless they have traveled to Portugal. It’s not a pretentious cuisine. It has a very peasant style. Eggs and broth is like having hot dogs and beans on a Saturday night. It’s about using your leftovers. In Portuguese cuisine, you can get the ingredients in a supermarket, and you don’t need a degree in French cooking to do it.”

Every night, lobster in some form shows up on the menu at South By Southwest, a newly opened restaurant in Camden. Chef Chris Roberts, a Texan, moved to Maine with his wife, Lorelei, five years ago and worked as cook and mate on windjammers. At sail, said Roberts, the best meals were lobster bakes on the beach.

He knows that when people come to Maine, they want lobster. At his restaurant, he features it with a southwestern flair each night and plans to share one of those recipes July 7.

“People come to Maine, they want lobster. But their friends who live here want to eat at a place that offers something else. If you want to think about a lazy man’s lobster, this is as lazy as it gets,” said Roberts, who trained at Le Cordon Bleu in Austin.

Ellen Barnes learned to cook lobster on the job. She and her husband moved to Maine in 1979 to become the owners, captains and cooks on the Stephen Taber, a schooner that is part of Maine’s historic windjammer fleet. Last year, the couple handed the boat over to their son, but Barnes has many stories to tell about cooking aboard the schooner. Some are in “A Taste of the Taber,” which is in its fifth printing since 1990.

Guests aboard the Taber were greatly disappointed if she didn’t serve lobster at least once during an expedition.

“Lobster is what they want the most,” said Barnes who will share her Spanish cuisine-inspired recipe for “Ayuh Paella” on July 28. “Maine lobster is a big deal. I have also prepared lobster in other dishes, but they still like just lobstah. And the steamed lobster is my favorite way of eating it, too. That’s how I grew up eating it: pure and unadulterated. That’s the be-all and end-all of classical Maine cooking. Nothing is surrounded by intricate sauces. It tastes good in sauce, but it tastes better plain.”

Daringly, Chef Bruce deMustchine, who was born in New Zealand, avoids the steamed or boiled lobster all together. His influences come from Asia, and his cookbook “Far East/Down East” offers recipes that combine lobster with sesame, cilantro, red chiles, green chiles, ginger and nam pla or nuoc mam, the Thai and Vietnamese words for fish sauce. His demonstration will be July 21.

“I have a dislike of the traditional way of cooking it,” said deMustchine, who recently opened the Kiwi Grille in Newburyport, Mass., where he prepares Maine lobster with diver-harvested sea scallops and jumbo shrimp with udon noodles, Asian vegetables and shiitake-ginger broth.

The lobster may be beloved on the coast of Maine, but the Marine Museum cooking classes in July will put its already popular flavor through the culinary practices of New Zealand, Portugal, Southwestern America and Spain.

The Penobscot Marine Museum in Searsport will present lobster-themed cooking demonstrations 11 a.m.-12:30 p.m. Wednesdays in July at the First Congregational Church vestry. The classes are free with the price of general admission, which is $8 for adults, $6 for seniors, $3 for ages 7-15, free for age 6 and younger, and $18 for families. For information, call 548-2529 or visit www.penobscotmarinemuseum.org.

Alicia Anstead can be reached at 990-8266 or aanstead@bangordailynews.net.