LinsFood | by Azlin Bloor

In-Depth Recipes, Food Culture & Food Stories

MENUMENU
  • Home
  • Recipes
    • Recipe Categories
      • Amuse-Bouches, Canapés and Starters
      • Cookies
      • Desserts
      • Dips, Sauces and Gravy Recipes
      • Eggless Recipes (Desserts & Baking)
      • Birthday and Occasion Cakes and Cupcakes
      • Cheese (Types and Recipes)
      • Gluten Free
      • Healthy Recipes
      • Meat Recipes
      • Noodle Recipes from around the World
      • Rice Recipes from around the World
      • Salad Recipes
      • Soups and Stews from around the World
      • Seafood
      • Vegan
      • Vegetarian
    • Seasonal Recipes
      • Winter Recipes
      • Spring Recipes
      • Summer Recipes
      • What's in Season Now?
      • Autumn (Fall) Recipes
    • Festive Recipes
      • Nowruz Recipes (Persian New Year)
      • Easter Recipes
      • Ramadan Recipes from around the World
      • Eid Recipes from around the World
      • Thanksgiving Recipes
      • Christmas Recipes from around the World
      • Chinese New Year Recipes
      • Valentine's Day Recipes
    • Collections
      • Alcoholic Drinks
      • Alcohol Free Drinks
      • Breakfast & Brunch Recipes
      • Cake Decorating 101
      • Fine Dining
      • Gin Recipes
      • Pantry Recipes
      • The Chilli Pepper Page
      • Top 12 Chicken Recipes
  • World Cuisines
    • American
    • British Recipes
    • Burmese Recipes
    • Chinese Recipes
    • East and West African Recipes
    • Eastern and Central European Recipes
    • French Recipes
    • South Asian Recipes (India, Pakistan & Sri Lanka)
      • Kashmiri Recipes
    • Indonesian Recipes
    • Italian Recipes
      • Risotto Masterclass
    • Japanese Recipes
    • Korean Recipes
    • Latin American Recipes
    • Middle Eastern and North African Recipes
      • Persian Recipes
      • Tagine Recipes
    • What is Singapore and Malaysian Food?
    • Spanish Recipes
    • Thai Recipes
    • Turkish Recipes
    • Vietnamese Recipes
  • Reference
    • Ingredients

      Ingredients
    • The Edible Garden

      The Edible Garden
    • What’s In Season?

      What's In Season?
    • Oven/Cooking Conversions

      Oven/Cooking Conversions
  • Travel and Family Fun
  • Media
  • About
    • About Me

      About Me
    • Online Cooking Courses

      How to cook noodles
    • My Cookbooks

      Singapore Recipes

Singapore Chilli Lobster – the Chilli Crab’s Classy Cousin

Published 01/05/2017, updated 08/01/2020 19 Comments

This Singapore Chilli Lobster recipe is a play on the iconic Singapore Chilli Crab. I thought I’d add a twist to an old favourite, because I'm cool like that!
Jump to Recipe Print Recipe
Singapore Chilli Lobster LinsFood
Singapore Chilli Lobster LinsFood


This Singapore Chilli Lobster recipe is a play on the iconic Singapore Chilli Crab. I thought I’d add a twist to an old favourite, because I’m cool like that! 😉

The Chilli Crab is, arguably, one of Singapore’s greatest culinary inventions, you can click here to read more about it and for my very, very old recipe from home.

You’ll pleased to hear that, unlike in the Chilli Crab recipe, I will not insist on live lobsters. If you can get, and are not terrified of, live crustacea, then go get some fresh lobsters. However, for practicality, a freshly cooked, halved lobster is probably the best option. After all, we will quickly cook the lobster in boiling water before immersing it in the chilli sauce.

But just in case, if you do fancy grappling with a live lobster, I’ll give you a quick step by step guide to cooking and preparing one. If you’ve got a cooked one as mentioned above, go straight to step 2 in the instructions.

Singapore Chilli Lobster LinsFood

Handy Hints on Cooking The Singapore Chilli Lobster

How to Cook a Live Lobster

Raw lobsters are usually dark with various specks of colour. Once cooked, the shells turn a deep red. When buying a live lobster, make sure that its claws are bound together, for obvious reasons.

You should kill the lobster just before cooking it. It’s generally agreed that the most humane way to do this is:

  1. Place the lobster in the freezer for about 2 hours to render it unconscious.
  2. At this point, the lobster shouldn’t be moving. Take a sharp knife, find the little cross over its head and plunge the knife straight through, very quickly; this ought to kill it instantly.
  3. Bring a large stockpot of water to boil and plunge the lobsters (one at a time if need be) and simmer for 15 minutes. The size of the lobsters will determine the length of cooking time. The first 500g (roughly 1lb) needs 15 minutes. Thereafter, it’s an additional 10 minutes for very extra 500g/about 1lb.
Singapore Chilli Lobster LinsFood

Preparing a Cooked Lobster

The Claws

Twist off the claws and crack them with a pair of lobster crackers, if you have them, or use a hammer.

Remove the meat with a small fork or spoon.

The Legs

Twist them off, flatten with the back of a knife and remove the meat with a lobster pick or some thin double ended metal skewers. If you happen to knit, a knitting needle will do nicely too!

Or, erm, just suck them out, like the locals do!

The Body

We need to split the body in half. Insert a sharp knife at the same point earlier, when you were killing the lobster, and press and cut down firmly along the body.

Do the same in the other direction to the head.

Separate the two halves and remove the gills, the stomach sac and the intestinal vein.

Leave the lobster in its shells and proceed with the recipes at step 2. One lobster will serve 2 people.

The green thing you see in the lobster is called tomalley and serves as the lobster’s liver and pancreas. Considered a delicacy, it can be eaten as is and is also used to flavour bisques and sauces.

However, there are health concerns, with reports of high levels of PCBs and toxins that cause Paralytic Shellfish Poisoning in lobsters from certain areas. Find out of you have got a lobster from a reputable source and if you fancy eating that green thing!

Specialist Ingredients for making the Singapore Chilli Lobster

Taucheo

This is salted, fermented soy beans. Click here to read more and for substitutes.

Tamarind

A souring agent, used in so many cuisines around the world. Click here to read more and for substitutes.

And before we head on to the recipe, here’s a random image from Singapore, the River Merchants. You can read more about these life sized statues here.

The River Merchants Singapore
The River Merchants Statues
Singapore Chilli Lobster LinsFood

Singapore Chilli Lobster

This Singapore Chilli Lobster recipe is a play on the iconic Singapore Chilli Crab. I thought I’d add a twist to an old favourite, because I’m cool like that!
4.94 from 65 votes
Print Pin Add to Collection Go to Collections
Course: Main Course with Rice or Bread
Cuisine: Singaporean Chinese
Keyword: lobster, seafood
Prep Time: 10 minutes
Cook Time: 17 minutes
Total Time: 27 minutes
Servings: 4
Calories: 194kcal
Author: Azlin Bloor

Ingredients

  • 2 medium lobsters
  • 2 tomatoes
  • 2 Tbsp tomato ketchup
  • 2 Tbsp tamarind (mashed with 4 Tbsp water)
  • 2 Tbsp vegetable oil
  • salt to taste
  • 125 ml (½ cup) water
  • 1 egg beaten lightly
  • small handful chopped coriander leaves cilantro
  • very small handful chives chopped

Grind to a paste

  • 1 medium onion
  • 1 fresh red chilli
  • 3 cloves garlic
  • 5 cm (2½") fresh ginger
  • 2 Tbsp taucheo or use same amount of hoisin sauce or dark miso paste

You’ll need a large wok.

    Instructions

    To prepare the tamarind:

    • Soak the pulp in the water for 10-20 minutes. The hotter the water, the less time you need.
    • After the soaking time, give it all good mix with, squeezing the pulp with your fingers, then strain through a medium or large mesh sieve. Discard the seeds and pulp.

    Prepare the Lobsters

    • Look above on how to prepare the lobsters.

    Let's cook the Chilli Lobster!

    • Heat oil in a large wok and fry the ingredients until fragrant.
    • Add the tomatoes, water, ketchup, tamarind and lobsters, and give it a good stir. Cover and cook for about 5 minutes, scooping up the sauce and covering the lobsters with it. You could also turn the lobster over for a couple of minutes.
    • Check the seasoning, add the egg and gently mix it in for 20 seconds, and turn the heat off and take the wok off the heat. The egg doesn’t want very long as you want wisps of it, not scrambled bits.
    • Garnish with the herbs and serve with some rice or crusty bread.

    Notes

    Total time assumes you are working with a cooked and halved lobster.

    Nutrition

    Serving: 4 | Calories: 194kcal | Carbohydrates: 16g | Protein: 13g | Fat: 9g | Saturated Fat: 6g | Cholesterol: 121mg | Sodium: 488mg | Potassium: 416mg | Fiber: 2g | Sugar: 11g | Vitamin A: 610IU | Vitamin C: 12mg | Calcium: 84mg | Iron: 1mg

    This Recipe’s Carbon Emission

    Did you make this recipe?Mention @azlinbloor and tag #linsfood!
    Made it? Upload your photosMention @azlinbloor and tag #linsfood!

    Comments

    1. Tiara Wilson says

      11/05/2017 at 8:20 pm

      My goodness. This lobster chilli looks absolutely delicious. I would eat this in a heartbeat! Thank you for sharing this yummy meal!

      Reply
    2. Molly says

      05/05/2017 at 5:18 am

      That lobster sounds so good right now. Good thing we are going to have lobster this weekend!

      Reply
    3. katriza says

      03/05/2017 at 11:06 pm

      Wow this looks amazing and definitely something I’ve been craving! Sending this to my husband to make it for me for Mother’s Day lol

      Reply
    4. Carol Cassara says

      03/05/2017 at 2:22 pm

      The sauce sure sounds amazing and I would love to give it a try. I think it’s a versatile recipe, in case you don’t have a good source of quality lobster.

      Reply
    5. Chi says

      03/05/2017 at 8:11 am

      I love seafood and this post is really helpful for me! Plus I’ll be going to Singapore very soon so I think I should keep this post in mind till i get there haha:)

      Reply
    6. Natalie says

      02/05/2017 at 8:11 pm

      I used to eat seafood but never got into crab. I mostly stuck to fish and shrimp.

      Reply
    7. Yuen Mi says

      02/05/2017 at 4:34 pm

      Love seafood, especially lobsters. Will save this for later reference. Always in need of more seafood recipes.

      Reply
    8. Lauren Cheely says

      02/05/2017 at 3:37 pm

      I know I wouldn’t be able to make this myself, as I am a horrible cook. But I want someone to make it for me. Man this looks delicious.

      Reply
    9. Cynthia Nicoletti says

      02/05/2017 at 2:56 pm

      Great recipe. I am going to save it and make it. Love lobster.

      Reply
    10. Sincerely Ophelia says

      02/05/2017 at 6:46 am

      lobster x chili? yes pleaseeeee! love the recipe cant wait to try!

      XOXO // Check out my latest post if you like 😉
      SINCERELY OPHELIA | CELINE TRIO REVIEW

      Reply
    11. David Elliott says

      02/05/2017 at 5:46 am

      I am not a huge lobster fan but this one looks absolutely amazing. I would love to try this one out.

      Reply
    12. Claudia Krusch says

      02/05/2017 at 1:20 am

      It has been so long since I had lobster. This looks so delicious I am sure it will be a hit. I will have to get the ingredients I need to make some this weekend.

      Reply
    13. Ana De- Jesus says

      02/05/2017 at 12:45 am

      I am a vegetarian but my friend loves lobster. In fact when he went out to America who would have it all the time, he would love this chilli version!

      Reply
    14. Lauren says

      01/05/2017 at 6:33 pm

      I have never had lobster before, but that looks so good!

      Reply
    15. Tonya Wilhelm says

      01/05/2017 at 6:02 pm

      This looks amazing. I never thought of lobster in a sauce like this. It looks pretty easy to make too. Thanks for the recipe.

      Reply
    16. Ritu Ahuja says

      01/05/2017 at 5:44 pm

      This looks amazing my dear. Yummy. 🙂

      Reply
    17. Jessica Taylor says

      01/05/2017 at 2:55 pm

      Oh wow this looks amazing! I am a sucker for lobster, so this is right up my alley!

      Reply
    18. Amber Myers says

      01/05/2017 at 2:02 pm

      My husband and kids would probably love this! I don’t like sea food, but I’d make it for them. They do adore their lobster.

      Reply
    19. Robin Rue says

      01/05/2017 at 11:40 am

      That sounds SO good. I am having people over for dinner this coming weekend and this would be awesome to serve 🙂

      Reply

    Leave a Reply Cancel reply

    Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

    Recipe Rating




    Hey folks, I’m Azlin Bloor; former chef, culinary instructor and mum of 4.
    Click here to read more about me!

    Language

    ArabicMalayFrenchSpanishHindiChinese (Simplified)ItalianRussianEnglishGerman

    My Latest Posts!

    • Beef Birria Consommé in a light blue bowlBeef Birria Recipe (Mexican Beef Stew)
    • Raspberry and Chocolate MargaritaRaspberry and Chocolate Margarita (a Valentine’s Day Cocktail)
    • dusting sugar on Eggless Baileys Chocolate CheesecakeEggless Baileys Chocolate Cheesecake (perfect for Easter)
    • Gushtaba recipe, Kashmiri Meatballs in yoghurtGushtaba (Kashmiri Meatballs in Yoghurt Gravy)
    my foodgawker gallery
    Tasty Query - recipes search engine
    Foodies100 Index of UK Food Blogs
    Foodies100

    Cook with me on Udemy!

    Cook With Me

    LinsFood contains affiliate links. This means that we earn a commission off any purchases that you might make by clicking on some of the product links.

    Contact Me     Privacy Policy     Cookie Policy
    Copyright Azlin Bloor | LinsFood.com 2011-2021