There is a seafood dish Jacks Monterey executive sous chef Hector Berumen brought out for a wine dinner. Paired with Chardonnay, it caught the attention of guests. So the executive sous chef for Jacks Monterey in the Portola Hotel & Spa took the next logical step: he and Executive Chef Carl Ashurst added it to the menu.
“Nobody has it on their menus,” Berumen recalls thinking. “I said, ‘We have to have new ideas.’”
In this case, the new idea is an old one. How old no one is certain, but culinary historians place lobster thermidor as a prized French dish in the 1890s. By the 1920s, Americans were swooning over it. As late as 1980, at least three restaurants on Monterey’s wharfs alone featured the classic preparation.
Then it all but disappeared.
Lobster thermidor is essentially half a lobster, the cooked meat added back to the shell and broiled. Cheese—yes, with seafood—is involved. But what sets the dish apart is its sauce. In describing it, many waver with uncertainty how much it owes to mornay and to velouté.
Berumen is untroubled by the distinction. His first kitchen gig four decades ago was in a French restaurant. And he prepared dishes at the former Wills Fargo, Casanova and other destination restaurants.
“I knew about the dish,” he says.
The lobster thermidor at Jacks is a twist on the classic—perfectly acceptable when past recipes are more guidelines than rules. The claw remains whole and the tail meat presented clean, with sauce on the side.
To prepare the sauce, Berumen uses cooked shells to create a lobster stock. He finishes with cream—“French style,” he says with a smile. In between are other dabs of flavor, such as cognac or white wine, tarragon and always mustard.
At Jacks the result is rich and raspy, briny and sweet, with a bite. Most of all, it’s like adding a more layered and nuanced lobster to the shellfish itself.
“We sell a lot,” the chef adds. “We get a lot of compliments.”
Although lobster thermidor had a long ride as a signature dish, by the 1990s it began to fade from restaurant menus.
Economic uncertainties may bear part of the blame. But until the 1980s, American fine dining culture was still tuned to European tradition. As culinary interests broadened, the appeal of staid lobster presentations such as cardinal, Newburg, a l’Americaine and thermidor waned—although they never went away.
Jacks has brought lobster thermidor back to the regular menu. And it pairs well with Chardonnay.