Know Filipino Food: Balut (Boiled Duck Egg with Duck Embryo)

Balut is a famous Filipino exotic food. People in the Philippines believe it's a good aphrodisiac. We often convince our foreign friends to try it just for fun. For me, personally, I love balut and I have been eating it since I was little. The juice inside is what really gets me excited. It tastes like bone broth, it's so tasty, plus we add the vinegar, salt and chilli to it to make the taste even more awakening.

Balut is a hardboiled duck egg with the developed duck embryo inside. Some of it may be some days into the late phase before it hatches that you'd see the beak of the duck as well as the feathers. We Filipinos eat all of that, we eat the entire contents of the egg. Even the hardened egg white that feels like rubber when you chew it.

Balut is one of those food items that are too high in cholesterol and uric acid, those people with heart problems and illnesses that needs to avoid high uric acid like gout, has to avoid eating this food.

Here is a picture of the balut we had last night. Would you be able to eat this when you are served one?

knowfilipino is a tag I started to use to showcase posts about Filipino food, tradition, values and culture.