CALGARY: All-you-can-eat lobsterfest

Along with important birthdays and appointments, I now need to add the Stampede City Kinsmen’s annual Lobsterfest to my calendar reminders.

The volunteer group is probably best known for organizing the Kinsmen Children’s Hospital Home Lottery, but it also holds smaller events to raise money for different charities. The Lobsterfest is a recent endeavour, now in its third year held at the Bowness Sportsplex.

For $34.95, you can eat as many lobsters as you can handle!

The group flew in 800 pounds of lobster from the Maritimes for the event; there were 250 people this year. You do the math.

I marvelled at the hard work by all the volunteers. Someone built an oversized boiler — with a hand-crank for the steamer cage — that could cook 75 lobsters at a time. It was 30 degrees outside as the guys cooked load after load of lobster.

There was a pretty smooth buffet set-up with two lines for the B.C. corn, roasted potatoes, buns and lots of melted butter.

At the end of each line, volunteers used sharp cleavers/knives to crack the claws and body of the lobster before putting it on your oval paper plate. (They were also drinking beer in between loads of lobster but no one lost a finger, so it’s all good.)

I think each lobster weighed about a pound. Forget about a fork and knife; everyone got their hands dirty eating the lobsters. It was awesome.

The volunteers did a good job making strategic cracks for easy access to the lobster meat. I shook my head at a few people I saw trying to cut into the shell with garden clippers they brought from home. I almost wanted to get the meat out for them before they hurt themselves.

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Most people were at the Lobsterfest because they knew a Kinsmen or Kinette; I stumbled on it because a Tweet showed up on my #yyc feed one day.

But sitting at long tables in the hall, it’s easy to make friends with the people around you. We knew we were at the right table, when Jason and another lady emphatically agreed that buying tickets for a raffle to upgrade to a steak dinner was useless because it would hinder how many lobsters they could eat.

I ate three lobsters; Jason ate two. (In fact, all the ladies at our table had three, and their husbands two.) Two lanky 20-somethings behind us polished off five lobsters, I swear.

There was a cash bar (credit cards accepted!) and throughout the night, the Kinsmen and Kinettes held 50-50 raffles, door prize draws, and the lottery for the “fancy” table where you got waiter service, steaks, champagne and dessert. The raffles alone raised more than $1,400 for the Canadian Cystic Fibrosis Foundation.

We had a blast at the Lobsterfest. Make sure you keep an eye out for it next year.

Stampede City Kinsmen Lobsterfest, check website for updates.