A lobster roll is a kind of sandwich

Sandwich

A sandwich is a food item, typically consisting of two or more slices of :bread with one or more fillings between them, or one slice of bread with a topping or toppings, commonly called an open sandwich. Sandwiches are a widely popular type of lunch food, typically taken to work or school, or...

 filled with lobster

Lobster

Clawed lobsters comprise a family of large marine crustaceans. Highly prized as seafood, lobsters are economically important, and are often one of the most profitable commodities in coastal areas they populate.Though several groups of crustaceans are known as lobsters, the clawed lobsters are most...

 meat. A traditional lobster roll contains the fresh cooked meat of a lobster, tossed with mayonnaise

Mayonnaise

Mayonnaise, , often abbreviated as mayo, is a sauce. It is a stable emulsion of oil, egg yolk and either vinegar or lemon juice, with many options for embellishment with other herbs and spices. Lecithin in the egg yolk is the emulsifier. Mayonnaise varies in color but is often white, cream, or pale...

 and served on a grilled hot dog bun

Hot dog bun

A hot dog bun is a type of soft bun shaped specifically to contain a hot dog. The original purpose of this bun was to make it possible to eat hot dogs without burning ones hands....

 or similar roll, so that the opening is on the top rather than on the side. The filling may also contain diced celery

Celery

Apium graveolens is a plant species in the family Apiaceae commonly known as celery or celeriac , depending on whether the petioles or roots are eaten: celery refers to the former and celeriac to the latter. Apium graveolens grows to 1 m tall...

 and/or scallion

Scallion

Scallions , are the edible plants of various Allium species, all of which are "onion-like", having hollow green leaves and lacking a fully developed root bulb.-Etymology:The words...

, or may use drawn butter

Drawn butter

Drawn butter is an American term for a preparation of melted butter, generally clarified. There does appear to be some confusion or disagreement about whether it must be clarified to be considered "drawn", or merely melted with the surface foam skimmed away, or even simply melted...

 instead of or in addition to mayonnaise. The sandwich may also contain lettuce

Lettuce

Lettuce is a temperate annual or biennial plant of the daisy family Asteraceae. It is most often grown as a leaf vegetable. It is eaten either raw, notably in salads, sandwiches, hamburgers, tacos, and many other dishes, or cooked, as in Chinese cuisine in which the stem becomes just as important...

, lemon

Lemon

The lemon is both a small evergreen tree native to Asia, and the tree's ellipsoidal yellow fruit. The fruit is used for culinary and non-culinary purposes throughout the world – primarily for its juice, though the pulp and rind are also used, mainly in cooking and baking...

 juice, salt

Salt

In chemistry, salts are ionic compounds that result from the neutralization reaction of an acid and a base. They are composed of cations and anions so that the product is electrically neutral...

 and black pepper

Black pepper

Black pepper is a flowering vine in the family Piperaceae, cultivated for its fruit, which is usually dried and used as a spice and seasoning. The fruit, known as a peppercorn when dried, is approximately in diameter, dark red when fully mature, and, like all drupes, contains a single seed...

. Traditional New England

New England

New England is a region in the northeastern corner of the United States consisting of the six states of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and Connecticut...

 restaurants serve lobster rolls (made with butter, not mayonaise) with potato chips or french fries

French fries

French fries , chips, fries, or French-fried potatoes are strips of deep-fried potato. North Americans tend to refer to any pieces of deep-fried potatoes as fries or French fries, while in the United Kingdom, Australia, Ireland and New Zealand, long, thinly cut slices of deep-fried potatoes are...

 on the side. As far back as 1970, chopped lobster meat heated in drawn butter was served on a hot dog bun at road side stands such as Red's Eats

Red's Eats

Red's Eats is a take-out restaurant located on U.S. Route 1 in Wiscasset, Maine. It is one of the most well-known and most written about restaurants in the state.- History :...

 in Maine

Maine

Maine is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States, bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the east and south, New Hampshire to the west, and the Canadian provinces of Quebec to the northwest and New Brunswick to the northeast. Maine is both the northernmost and easternmost...

, but have since given way to the chilled lobster "salad" prevalent today everywhere but Connecticut

Connecticut

Connecticut is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States. It is bordered by Rhode Island to the east, Massachusetts to the north, and the state of New York to the west and the south .Connecticut is named for the Connecticut River, the major U.S. river that approximately...

.

Lobster rolls in the U.S. are especially associated with the state of Maine, but are also commonly available at seafood

Seafood

Seafood is any form of marine life regarded as food by humans. Seafoods include fish, molluscs , crustaceans , echinoderms . Edible sea plants, such as some seaweeds and microalgae, are also seafood, and are widely eaten around the world, especially in Asia...

 restaurants in the other New England states and on Eastern Long Island

Long Island

Long Island is an island located in the southeast part of the U.S. state of New York, just east of Manhattan. Stretching northeast into the Atlantic Ocean, Long Island contains four counties, two of which are boroughs of New York City , and two of which are mainly suburban...

, where lobster fishing is common. They tend to be virtually unheard-of in landlocked regions (such as the Upper Midwest

Upper Midwest

The Upper Midwest is a region in the northern portion of the U.S. Census Bureau's Midwestern United States. It is largely a sub-region of the midwest. Although there are no uniformly agreed-upon boundaries, the region is most commonly used to refer to the states of Minnesota, Wisconsin, and...

), where fresh lobster is more expensive and more difficult to obtain.

Lobster rolls prepared in Maine generally have several common characteristics: first, the roll itself is a regular split hot dog roll that has been lightly buttered on the outside and lightly grilled; second, the lobster meat in the roll is usually served cold, rather than warm or hot; third, there can be a very light spread of mayonnaise inside the bun. The lobster meat is usually knuckle, claw, and tail meat chunks.

They are a staple summer meal throughout the Maritime provinces in Canada

Canada

Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

, particularly Nova Scotia

Nova Scotia

Nova Scotia is one of Canada's three Maritime provinces and is the most populous province in Atlantic Canada. The name of the province is Latin for "New Scotland," but "Nova Scotia" is the recognized, English-language name of the province. The provincial capital is Halifax. Nova Scotia is the...

 where they may also appear on hamburger buns, baguettes, or other types of bread rolls — even pita pockets. The traditional sides are potato chips and dill pickles.

Some McDonald's

McDonald's

McDonald's Corporation is the world's largest chain of hamburger fast food restaurants, serving around 64 million customers daily in 119 countries. Headquartered in the United States, the company began in 1940 as a barbecue restaurant operated by the eponymous Richard and Maurice McDonald; in 1948...

 restaurants in New England and the Canadian Maritimes offer lobster rolls as a seasonal menu item, called the McLobster Roll.

There is also a variant called the Connecticut lobster roll, which is warm lobster, fresh from the shell with drawn butter. According to the book Connecticut Icons, the Connecticut roll was introduced in the 1930s at a restaurant in Milford on the Post Road called Perry's, following a request from a traveling salesman who frequented the place. Once Perry's put the new sandwich on its menu, its popularity spread up and down the Connecticut coast, but not far beyond.