Nanjing Food---Prosperous Egg

旺鸡蛋

Nanjing's Prosperous Egg is also known as Hairy Egg, or Living Pearl. It was traditionally known that this egg had been hatched by chicken in failure, and to be eaten with salt after cooking in boiling water. But in recent years, due to hygienic reasons, the eggs have been the healthier ones that are successfully hatched for about 15 days.

Some people regard this snack is cruel and uncivilized, however others think that this is a matter of eating habit. Nanjing people, especially young women, love the eggs very much. This sentiment is so hard to understand for outsiders. But in fact this delicacy is very nutritious. It contains the same nutrient as human embryo, therefore it is so beneficial for facial function of young women.

The raw material for this delicacy is very cheap. Sometimes, the unsuccessfully hatched chickens inside the egg are well formed and others not but only egg yolks and whites. So if you like to eat a whole small chicken is by luck. A stall who sells prosperous eggs has an old and small gas stove with an aluminum basin which has many eggs floating on the hot water surface. Customers are standing around the stove and choosing their favorite eggs by past experience. They open the husk, snatch the tiny chicken inside, remove the short hairs on it and eat it. A person often can eat five to six eggs.

You may feel fear if you are first time to eat such strange snack, but you may become bolder and like it because the great taste.