Thursday, January 28, 2010

We’re Hatching Quail!


We set 36 beautiful coturnix quail eggs 1/26/2010. 16 days or so later the slippery little suckers should be springing out to take on the world. Quail are crazy little birds, they bound off walls, flutter as if they can fly high, and lay rich and cream little eggs. They will start laying eggs at about 6 weeks of age, from then on they will lay about 6 a week. If we aren’t careful we could have a quail takeover of the farm. Not really, they won’t be hatching their own chicks so we can have a bit of population control. However, if I have anything to do with it we won’t stop at these 36 eggs.

You’re probably wondering what we plan to do with our quail. Well, I love their personalities, so for me it is largely about the entertainment, such as with the chickens. We will eat and sell the eggs though. They are a delicacy all around the world, essential in Japanese cuisine. I will try to post some recipes as we experiment ourselves. The first we will try is an appetizer. You line a mini-cupcake/muffin tin with prosciutto then crack a quail egg into the whole, add some fresh Parmesan and chives. Bake & serve. When we finally get to try it with quail eggs I will post the results! I love the idea of single-bit deviled eggs for Easter, how fun will that be. It takes about 4-6 quail eggs to equal a large egg, but they are very rich in flavor.


Here are some pictures of the incubator and the eggs. They will pretty much look like this until day 13 when we will place them in the hatcher. When they hatch they will be wet, hopefully I will be home to capture some of the early moments of their lives, if not, the first pictures will be of when they dry out to look like little balls of fluff. They are cuter then anyway. Regardless, I intend to keep you informed about their progress. They grow up so quick it will be no time before they are ready to start laying eggs and we get to start the cycle all over again!

Gotta go check on the 'bator,

Natalie

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