Quail Eggs

I believe the first time that I ever saw anyone eat a quail egg was when my oldest granddaughter was tiny and living in Japan. Quail eggs are commonly eaten in Japan and my granddaughter loved them and often ate them hard boiled. 

A packet of 24 quail eggs.

While visiting my daughter and her family in Tokyo, she arranged for us to eat at a restaurant that only served horse and one of the dishes was horse tartar, raw ground horse with a raw quail egg on top. I've eaten beef tartar several times since then and I believe at least one other of those times it came with a raw quail egg.

Raw quail egg on horse tartar in Tokyo.

I think I bought about a dozen a few years years ago and ate them hard boiled, and that was my only experience cooking them myself until recently. A good friend, C.c. Claudia, who raises quail, gave us some quail eggs on several two occasions recently. One was when Claudia gave me a plastic holder with 24 of them, and some time later, Claudia gave my visiting granddaughters a gallon jar about three-fourths full of them. 

Hard-boiled quail eggs on the left and uncooked quail eggs on the right. 

1001 Foods You Must Eat Before You Die lists quail eggs as one of them. It notes that they are ideally suited as a garnish in restaurants. A couple of other interesting bits: they are richer and have more cholesterol than chicken eggs and putting vinegar in boiling water makes the shells easier to peel (I wish I'd read that before peeling the many quail eggs I've had recently). 

We tried them fried on several occasions. I found it difficult to break open the shell without puncturing the yolk as the yolk has a pretty strong membrane protecting it. They taste pretty close to the same as chicken eggs, but appear to have a higher ratio of yolk. These little miniature fried eggs were very fun.

Seven quail eggs in a frying pan. Note that I broke three of the yolks trying to crack them open. 

I also tried them hard boiled whole on sandwiches and really liked them that way. One one occasion I tried about five of them on a sandwich with elk chorizo and the eggs provided a very nice contrast, both texturally and taste wise, to the chorizo. I also tried a sandwich with quail eggs, avocado, tomatoes and lettuce and they were very good there as well. 

Quail eggs on elk chorizo (left). 

Quail eggs on a vegetarian sandwich.