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a
For centuries the langouste (European spiny lobster, Palinurus elephas) has had
pay

who

others

LOBSTER

still

and

broiled,

others an entourage of devotees who will stop at nothing to have their favorite food. premium for the touch of a stellate chef. It’s a plate for the first date, and, judging by the libidinous way it is savored, it would seem to have aphrodisiacal qualities

boiled,

it
like

who A Gallehaut was French Minister of Ecology François De Rugy’s for “private councils,” many of them featuring langoustes.

passion for the langoustes. He was recently forced to resign over
Science has yet to confirm the existence of organoleptic fac-
allegations of excessive spending of public funds for lavish din- tors capable of unleashing the passions between two individuals,
TEXT BY DAVIDE PAOLINI those are There simply for its succulent, refined, and exclusive flesh, but espe- rably elicits images of sex. When you eat a langouste, you take it
but the aphrodisiacal fame of certain foods, such as oysters, per-
ners featuring enormous specimens.
The passion for this crustacean is quite widespread, not sists, partially because the sensual method of eating them inexo-
cially because it is considered prestigious and—right or wrong— in your hands and suck the meat out of the legs . . . a very erotic
an aphrodisiac. And so it must be ordered on special occasions, gesture that would be entirely lost if you used a knife and fork.
But let us take a moment to debunk the belief that the spiny
especially the first date. Its repute as an aphrodisiac dates to an-
cient times. Libido-boosting powers were attributed to it as far lobster is kin to the true lobster (Homarus gammarus): with its mas-
back as the third century BC. This belief was actually codified in sive claws, the lobster is simply not a male langouste. The two de-
nineteenth-century medical texts. In the early twentieth centu- capods are actually in two entirely different families but are often
ry, Omero Rompini, a physician from Catania, author of Cucina confused, mainly because they are both referred to as “lobsters” in
dell’amore, published 130 recipes for aphrodisiacal dishes and menus English (spiny or true), and also because of certain anatomical and

64 Food Protagonist Protagonist Food 65