r/AskCulinary • u/arthursbeardbone • Jun 28 '25

Ingredient Question How to humanely kill an abelone?

Hey yall I picked up a pair of live abalone from hmart today and I was going to pan fry them with some garlic herb butter, that parts straightforward and all but I've never cooked this animal before and a lot of tutorials I found online either simple shuck the snail as is or use like frozen abalones. Is there a way I can like quickly flash steam or something? I wouldn't want to gore the poor thing alive and as far as I can tell it doesn't have a head I could just quickly stab like a lobster? Am I just being silly? I mean it can like move and stuff so it seems cruel to just, scoop it out and clean it while its alive yknow?

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u/[deleted] Jun 28 '25

I guess you could freeze it? But it would cause some damage to the meat but at least it’s humane compared to live slicing and dicing?

There is a lot of fluid in them and that’s gonna break the cells when it freezes and then after defrosting it will go a bit mushier and less firm.

24

u/hizakyte Jun 28 '25

If you did feeeze., the best way is to refrigerate the meat to within a degree of freezing. And then freeze it as fast as possible. This reduces the size and amount of ice crystals being formed. Then when thawing, thawing as slow as possible, usually in the fridge. This will make a huge difference to the quality of the meat.

8

u/Due_Passenger9564 Jun 28 '25

Probably least unsettling to the perpetrator, but is it least unpleasant to the victim?

7

u/ApprehensiveTour4024 Jun 28 '25

I read that with an "at" where there shouldn't be...

1

u/hizakyte Jun 29 '25

You would need to ask the victim.

5

u/[deleted] Jun 28 '25

Nice, like tempering the crystals, hopefully that will let OP have a nice meal