About Spearos Kitchen
Spearos Kitchen is an ocean to table education platform focused on helping the recreational spearfishing and fishing communities responsibly utilize their catch through recipes, species guides, fillet tutorials, and educational content.
What is Florida Spiny Lobster Mini Season?
I decided to make this list of 14 Florida lobster recipes in honor of mini-season this year. Florida’s lobster mini-season is a two-day recreational harvest that takes place each summer just before the regular spiny lobster season begins. It gives recreational divers and snorkelers the opportunity to harvest Florida spiny lobsters ahead of the start of commercial lobster season – and also make some delicious Florida lobster recipes.
Mini-season is especially popular throughout the Florida Keys and South Florida, where thousands of recreational lobsterers take to the water in search of legal-sized spiny lobsters hiding under ledges, reefs, and rocky structures. The season is limited to just two days and is governed by specific regulations, including bag limits, size requirements, and location restrictions. Make sure to review the current Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) rules if you plan on participating.
What To Do With Each Part
Spiny lobsters contain several different parts that can all be used to make different dishes. The cool part about this list of Florida lobster recipes is that they don’t just use the tail meat, as most recipes would. Here’s a breakdown of ideas that you can make with each part.
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Knuckles/Antennas: Contain more meat than you might think, can use as a topper or for lobster cakes if you have enough of them.
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Head: Great for broths and soups – also contain a lot of meat if you put in some work.
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Legs: Bigger ones hold a good amount of meat that can be used in pasta dishes or lobster cakes.
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Shells: Leftover shells can be used as the base for a broth, sauce, or bisque.
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Why Use Every Part
I think the biggest point I am trying to get across here is the foundation of what Spearos Kitchen was built on: take less, use more. It might seem gimmicky, but the basic premise is that if we are all good stewards of what we choose to harvest, maybe we don’t need as much as we once thought.
The same goes for fish, and everything else we harvest from the ocean. I don’t think sustainability can easily be measured when it comes to our vast oceans, but I do know that how much we utilize of what we harvest can be. We have some incredible dishes on our recipes page that show what is possible with parts of the fish and lobster that are commonly overlooked – take a look and enjoy!
The Recipes
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