Last Saturday night, Melissa Gitlin, 44, and her husband, Jordan Gitlin, 45, were looking to have a nice dinner in the city with another couple they hadn’t seen for a while. On a friend’s suggestion, the Gitlins, who live in Port Washington, LI, and describe themselves as adventurous diners who love eating out, headed to Louro, a West Village restaurant that serves creative new American fare.
When it came time to order something special to share with old, dear friends, the Gitlins didn’t opt for a pricey platter of raw shellfish or a decadent foie gras appetizer. Instead, they went for an emu egg.
Yes, an emu egg.
Louro chef David Santos put a scrambled emu egg on his dinner and brunch menus a few weeks back, attracting customers looking to crack into something unique — for a price. The emu egg costs $90.
“It’s something that people have never tried, something that people have never seen,” says Santos, 34.
The exotic egg is roughly the equivalent of a dozen chicken eggs and is served as a starter course meant to be shared by four to eight people. (It’s also occasionally served as part of the restaurant’s tasting menu.) It’s a stunning, deep teal color and weighs as much as 2 pounds. To play up the egg’s dramatic looks, Santos first has a server present it to the table whole and uncooked on what he calls a “little nest” of fresh thyme and bay leaves.
The Gitlins and their friends, Allyson and Jon Cherins, don’t know what to expect when the egg comes out.
“We’re all emu egg virgins,” quips Jordan, a pediatric urologist.
“It’s so beautiful, is it going to hatch?” exclaims Allyson, 43, a fitness instructor who lives in Maplewood, NJ, upon first seeing it.
“What if some bird came shooting out?” she jokes.
After the presentation, the egg is whisked back to Santos. He cracks it open on the kitchen counter, as you might with a normal chicken egg, albeit with more caution, and into a mixing bowl.
“You have to be careful. The shell is pretty thick, but it’s not ostrich-egg thick,” says the chef, who loves working with exotic eggs. He’s had turkey, ostrich, duck and quail eggs on his menu at various points.
He scrambles the egg with wild mushrooms over low heat until it has a creamy, custard-like texture, similar to polenta or risotto.
“It’s nice and creamy,” says Santos, who tops off the scramble with truffle oil and a generous shaving of fresh Bianchetti truffles.
The diners are impressed — and surprised.
“It smells fantastic,” exclaims Allyson. “I did not expect it to be like this.”
Santos loves playing on the freaky connotations some draw with the mysterious blue-green egg.
In early April, he plans to serve a “Game of Thrones” dinner — part of a BYOB supper-club series that happens every Monday at Louro. Each course will relate to a “Thrones” character. The third dish of the evening will feature an emu egg in homage to Daenerys Targaryen, the beautiful, silverhaired young queen who has three dragon eggs that eventually hatch.
Santos, who loves pop culture, served the emu/dragon egg for a “Thrones” dinner last year, and it was a hit.
“Last year’s dish was so popular, I had to bring it back,” he says.
The Gitlins and the Cherins, who had the eggs as part of Louro’s five-course, $65 tasting menu, are divided on whether they’d go back to Louro and order the egg on its own for $90.
Jordan Gitlin says he would. “We’ll definitely head back and maybe bring some other friends and introduce them to the emu. It’s really fun,” he says enthusiastically. “It’s kind of like a kitschy delicacy … It was like a pterodactyl egg. It was huge!”
He’ll have to go back fairly soon. Santos estimates that the egg will only be on the menu for another month or so before it goes out of season — exotic eggs, like fruits and veggies, have seasons. He gets the eggs from D’Artagnan, a major gourmet food purveyor that works with a New Jersey emu farmer. And while $90 may seem quite steep for scrambled eggs, Santos says the dish isn’t a money maker. The eggs cost about $30 each and, he says, the truffles another $30.
“That’s two-thirds cost for me,” says Santos. “That’s not a good operating cost.”
(For those looking to scramble up an emu egg themselves, Whole Foods also occasionally has them for sale, at $29.99 a pop.)
And while Allyson Cherins says the price tag would prevent her from ordering Louro’s emu egg again, it was her favorite dish of the meal.
“It was very rich and very decadent.”
She just has one regret: “We should have asked to keep the shell.”
All about emu!
➧ Gizzard of Oz: Emus are native to Australia, where they are the national bird. The emu, along with the kangaroo, is featured on Australia’s Commonwealth Coat of Arms.
➧ Big birds: The emu is one of the largest living birds, second only to the ostrich. Adults can grow up to 6 ½ feet tall and weigh close to 150 pounds.
➧ Infrequent flyers: The emu has tiny wings and, along with the ostrich and other birds native to the southern hemisphere, belongs to a class of fowl that isn’t able to fly but can run quite quickly. Emus are capable of running upward of 30 miles per hour.
➧ Funky feathers: The emu’s large body is covered in shaggy feathers that are brown-and-white in adolescence and become solid brown in adulthood.
➧ Stoners: In addition to plants and insects, emus also eat stones to help with digestion.
➧ Deep throat: The birds have a pouch in their throat that they inflate to make deep, grunting noises. These noises are used for communication, often during mating season, and can be heard more than a mile away.
➧ Daddy day care: Female emus typically lay five to 15 eggs over a span of a few days. They then abandon their eggs, leaving their mates to incubate them. The eggs hatch after 60 days, and dad takes care of the babies by himself for up to 18 months.
➧ Big yolk: Throughout the egg-laying season (late fall to mid-spring), female emus usually lay a total of 20 to 40 eggs.