All we had to do was travel a couple hours outside of Boston to discover these treats!
First, the photo: this is an emu egg, from Songline Emu Farm in Gill, Ma, a tiny town on Route 2, just outside of the gay paradise of Northampton, where these two gays had weekended. This baby was just sitting out in the produce section of the Northampton Coop. Some fun facts about emu eggs include:
You need a drill to get at it.
You should whip it as though to scramble it, but then pour it into ice cube trays and freeze to use like individual eggs later.
It’s about the equivalent of 20 chicken eggs.
That’s Kristi’s hand holding it. She doesn’t have big hands, but she is close to 6′ tall, if that helps at all with perspective on that puppy.
$20 per egg.
A couple of bakeries in the valley out west there are growing their own grain, and encouraging their customers to do the same by tearing up their lawns and replacing it with wheat fields. They’re also baking with locally produced grains — not wheat yet, but rye, spelt and oats.
Meanwhile Pioneer Valley Heritage Grains, a CSA project of Wheatberry Bakery in Amherst, is sold out. They’re growing amaranth, peas, quinoa, wheat, spelt & rye. Did anyone else see that PBS series Colonial House? If I could get me hands on some peas, I could make peas porridge and other sticky, hearty colonial fare like the lovely ladies of Colonial House.