[IMGL]http://i132.photobucket.com/albums/q32/experimentego/Balut_Egg.jpg[/IMGL]Just had some
balut. Yum, yum.
It's basically an aborted duck fetus.
It's been featured as a
'challenge' on Fear Factor before. They're actually quite delicious, but the Fear Factor staff make it a point to cook it themselves. I get the feeling they don't do it very well, since the write up emphasizes "a terrible smell that works its way into your nostrils" and "a miniature duck inside, complete with feathers!" and I doubt they intend to cook it in any way as to make it EASIER for their contestants to eat.
Ideally, they should be cooked and aged such that the feathers and beak and claws of the duck are not present, or at the very least --- soft and underdeveloped --- and again, I doubt Fear Factor tries to do anything about that.
They are absolutely delicious, have a great salty taste and go wonderful with beer. And I don't even drink beer. I just use beer as an excuse to be given balut.
Unfortunately, it is said to be next to impossible to obtain good balut in the United States, so I doubt any of the Yanquis on this board could get a chance to appreciate it.
However, eating balut is an act of reverence. You can't just pop the whole thing in your mouth, unless you have a big mouth. You have to eat it component by component --- the brothy soupy fluids inside, the tasty yolky stuff, the duck fetus. According to one writer, it is a reverent contemplation of the duckling, who is forever asleep.
All hail the balut.
