Luke's Lobster

It doesn’t take a master chef to make a great lobster roll. It takes great lobster. Luke Holden knows where to get the best stuff around...

Holden was born and raised in Cape Elizabeth, a small town on the coast of Maine. He grew up lobstering, built his own skiff, and launched a lobster company while still in high school. When Luke moved to New York to work in finance, he was dismayed to see lobster rolls—drowning in mayo and diluted with celery—priced anywhere from $20 to $30. Luke and his dad, Jeff, had longstanding relationships with lobstermen, which earned them access to Maine’s best catch. So they started putting the pieces together to get that sweet lobster down to the city.

On foggy Maine mornings, burly lobstermen in orange Grundens haul traps from the open seas, and they're taken from the dock to Luke’s seafood processing business. In just hours, the frisky pinchers are steamed, picked, and individually wrapped before they’re sent south to Luke’s Lobster. The lobster meat is sealed in plastic bags to lock in that fresh-from-the-ocean taste and to prevent contamination. Each plastic bag contains a quarter-pound of pure, unadulterated lobster meat from 5 or 6 unlucky lobster claws (yep, it takes that many lobsters for each roll!).

Throughout the trek from Maine to our lobster shacks, the lobster meat remains in pristine condition, having last touched Maine air. The result is a deliciously fresh lobster roll that allows you to truly taste Maine at its best.