By James Kim

For most families in America, the centerpiece of the Thanksgiving feast is a full-size, roasted turkey. It is a festive staple accompanied by other western classics such as casserole, cranberry sauce, and pumpkin pie. This norm is completely foreign to me. As a Korean family, our Thanksgiving cuisine consists of a rather wild combination of different Asian-fusion dishes, from sashimi to dim sum to kimchi. In lieu of an oil-fried turkey, we prepare a seafood boil, a colorful mix of all types of different crustaceans including lobster, mussels, clams, and crab, all boiled together in a flavorful broth. After eagerly suiting up with a plastic bib and a pair of disposable gloves, I always find myself digging through the aromatic hodgepodge to find my favorite bit of the bunch: lobster. The savory scent, the satisfying crack that comes from opening the bright red shell, the intense, umami flavor; it all comes together to provide an experience nothing short of heavenly. 

For our family, lobster is a special treat. Likewise for many people around the world, lobster is a high-value food and has become synonymous with fine dining and special occasions. Case in point, Akelare, an upscale restaurant located in the highly affluent, coastal city of San Sebastian, Spain was recently awarded three Michelin stars, largely thanks to their expertly crafted signature dish, “roasted lobster and spiced balloon” (“Spain’s Akelare”).

In statistics, a confounding variable spoils a claim’s validity when it overlaps with the claim’s suggested cause. At face value, society’s current ardor for lobster potentially confounds the purity behind my passion for lobster. Would I love lobster the same under America's cultural stigmas centuries ago, or would I follow that crowd’s disdain for it? Do I really love lobster for what it is, or is my love for lobster nothing more than a function of its overwhelming status and is thus undermined? Is my love for lobster shallow? The heart of my rebuttal to this sentiment lies in my belief that food is not made special by intrinsic means. The true value of food is not measured by how expensive it is, how difficult it is to obtain, what socioeconomic class it belongs to, or even what it tastes like. It will always boil down to the moments, the fond memories shared with valuable people. My love for lobster is grounded in quality time. At the end of the day, that Thanksgiving feast is not made special by the food on the table, but rather by the people surrounding that table. My love for lobster is, without question, a direct outcome of the love I have fostered for my friends and family. The emotional weight of my desire to cherish and protect these relationships takes logical precedence over my consideration of what society thinks. Therefore, I declare my allegiances to lobster, legitimate.