Balut, that is a boiled duck egg with an embryo inside
My Filipino friend loves it: hanging out on the boulevard and eating Balut, and I think it is nasty. Whenever he finishes such an ‘egg’ I tease him by saying: there’s a feather stuck between your teeth.
They are available from 16 days up and the best balut s 21 days. But can you imagine? The duck-egg hatches at
28 days, 35 days at the most, depending on the breed. So a 21 days egg, is merely a baby duck in a shell, not much egg left by then.
They are cheap as ever, 20 pesos per egg
Happily, he rubs his belly after eating an egg or 2 while I watch the sea or the stars and try to ignore the smell of boiled chicken and something indescribably filthy. But maybe that last part is my imagination running wild.
The whole idea troubles me. A boiled baby chick in a shell. It is cruel, filthy and well, everything except civilized, normal and its carnal texture is revolting.
Animal cruelty, I tell my friend as he breaks open the egg and drinks the fluid on top. How do you think that chick felt when suddenly his world become boiling hot? And he answers with a big grin: probably the same as your beloved crab feels when it is boiled.
Balut is sold as street-food in the Philippines, but also in other parts of Asia. You eat the egg with salt and spicy vinegar.
They say, as in hearsay, that it is good for your libido. And you do not need any viagra when you eat balut regularly. But then again, my friend tells me that with everything weird he eats, like cow skin, intestine soup and fish-heads.
I know, it is more in my imagination than in that egg, but I cannot help myself to revolt every time I see him devour an egg and I ignore the filled cheek as he happily chews his chick.
Sometimes he even spits out a little bone…….yuck!
Balut means ‘wrapped’ and I’m told that the first balut was invented in Pateros, a first-class municipality in Metro Manila, which is famous for a duck-raising industry and the invention of the slow boiling of fertilized duck eggs. Balut is recognized as a typical Filipino appetizer, but possibly balut is originated from China – brought to the Philippines by Chinese traders and migrants.
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