Chicken or Egg ?

I thought I'd have to go to the Philipines for this one. It's actually been on the top of my "must eat it!" list for years. But lucky me! I found it last night, right around the corner from the Foreign Correspondants building in Phnom Penh. A nice lady with a cart had them.

Here's the deal: They take duck eggs in which the embryo has begun to form in to a real live chick, and hard boil them. Good with salt, pepper and lime. I bought two, one for my father, who insisted he was full from the salad he had for dinner (wimp!). Anyway, I got the whole thing on video.



You peel the egg shell off and inside is a duck egg (about 2-3 times as big as a normal chicken egg) and the egg is surrounded by blood vessels, and you can see the early form of a duck baby within the white of the egg. The yolk is still separate. The first bite had a crunchy surprise in the middle, which clearly resembled a beek and duck head. You can see the formation of feathers throughout the egg. Anyway, the whole treat had a pleasant savory flavor and denser texture than conventional hard-boiled eggs. I'm going to pick up a couple more for our road trip south today.

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OK, I've tried a few more now and found that they're available at different stages of embryonic development. You can get them younger (more like an egg), older (almost hatched), or anywhere inbetween. All are delicious. Although this one sounds probably the most "weird" of all weird meats, it's one of the most tasty. This is a popular snack food, with locals eating it while watching TV sports, picnicking, or as an appetizer to a full meal.

In the Philipines they call them balut eggs. Actually, I'll soon travel to Nanjing, China, where chicken abortions are a local specialty.