Balut and Beer

Outside the hotel one of the locals had a stand with a sign that said Balut. Now, for those people that don’t know what Balut is, you can probably find it on many lists containing the most disgusting foods in the entire world.

I knew what it was, I had sent an email to Martin with a link describing it and told him that he would be eating this in a few weeks time. No he would not, was the answer, haha

It is basically a duck egg that is very close to hatching, which is then boiled and eaten. 

Crack the shell and you will find the almost developed duckling in there, eyes, beak, feathers… Yup, that really does not sound delicious does it?

The guys selling it outside for 15 pesos a piece noticed we had just arrived and asked us right away if we wanted one? I think it is quite amusing for them to see Westerners eat their foods, maybe they will puke or not. We had been laughing whenever asked, but saw most local people eat the eggs now and then as a small snack.

We had already been sipping a few beers on the Verde Island tour back so we were in a good mood already. 

For some reason we seemed to get along better with the 4 local guys working in the dive shop, so we decided to invite them out for the beer and food, to show them our appreciation and to get to know them a little better. Claire and Jenny were there too, and some other girls also showed up to join the party expecting free drinks just because they were girls. There was a lot of laughing, drinking and new friendships being made.

At some point we decide it is time for a snack, so we asked one of the guys to go and buy some balut for the guys, maybe we would be brave enough to try it now?

He comes back and starts eating one to show us how to do it and this is the first time we get to see it up close.

It is a little intimidating to see the almost developed duck in the egg, I have to admit that. I was determined I wanted to try it, I can’t be that bad when people eat it almost every day. Luckily Martin didn’t chicken out either and so was the first to jump on the Balut challenge.

He cracked the shell open, and the inner parts of the egg became visible. The big grin on the Captain’s face was replaced with another facial expression showing a little fear afterall, haha. But he ate it, and eventually finished the thing and could start smiling and laughing again.

Time to join the party, so the next egg was cracked op, the juices sucked out and the snack was ready to be eaten. I can’t say I was too comfortable either, hoping that what even happened, I wouldn’t end up puking in the middle of the bar. It is more fear for the unknown that any bad stories or examples that makes this such a special thing to eat. 

The first part wasn’t actually too bad, tasted like egg, but I was told it is the egg yolk that the embryo feeds on. Makes sense, because a few moments later I get to the actual duck under development. That part was quite chewy and tasted like a mix of egg and chicken, with some hard parts in there like the beek and the body parts already developed. At the end there was only an empty shell left and even though the newly digested duck(egg) turned around in the stomach a couple of times, it was not going out the same way it came in. Mission accomplished, yeah!

The local guys were cheering, they thought it was great too. The American dive master Jamie, came over and checked what we were doing, he left with the sound as if he was going to puke himself just from watching, haha

When Jenny’s shift was over, we all went out for dinner and some more drinks. It was really nice to get to know people, their lives and how things are different from both Denmark and the American culture. It might look as if we were trying to buy ourselves some new friends here, but that was definitely not the case. We wanted to show our appreciation to the guys and get to know them a little better and them know us better, because they were just as curious about us as we were about them.