Pasta served with white wine and homemade bread

In Atami there is a farmer & fisherman's market on Saturday evening. I look forward to this market since they usually sell these mini lobsters. I did a quick check on Wikipedia so take a look for the official name. This is a species unique to Japan.

Mini Lobsters from Japan

 I bought 3 of them -- small, medium and large. Since two were small, I was given a discount of two for one. Total cost was 1,000 yen (about $10 US dollars). Not a bad price!

How to start?  First, cut off the tail since these will be cooked separately later. The long antenna are dangerous so cut those off too.

Slice an onion and par boil several tomatoes to remove the skin. Put onions in the pan and generously sprinkle with olive oil and lightly fry. Add the tomatoes and cook together. Add garlic as you like also.

Now add the lobster bodies to the sauce so that the sauce picks up the rich flavor. Let this cook for 30 - 45 minutes so the flavors are well blended. You can add additional sauce depending on how many you need to feed. I added a can of tomatoes.

Everything goes into the pot!

You can start cooking the pasta at this time too.

After cooking for about 45 minutes, remove the lobster bodies. Put the sauce in a blender &  puree. Put a sieve over the pot as you pour it back in - this removes all of the rough ingredients. Add lobster bodies again and reduce sauce for about 20 minutes.

Be careful putting the sauce into a blender since it is HOT!!

Eggplants in Japan

 These type of eggplant are the most popular in Japan. It is difficult to find the large rounds ones.

Cut off the ends and slice the eggplant in pieces. Put in a pan with olive oil and fry until lightly browned.

To finish the pasta, put the lobster tails ino the sauce to cook. These cook quickly in about 10 minutes or less.

Remove the tails and lobster bodies from the sauce. Stir the sauce and remove anything left from the lobsters.

Remove the meat from the lobster tails.

Put the pasta in a bowl and pour sauce over it. Include eggplant pieces and the lobster tails. Sprinkle with cheese and serve.

Fry in olive until browned