Look! Local Ostrich and Emu Eggs at Whole Foods

We don’t visit the local Whole Foods very often, and we hadn’t inspected their loose selection of local eggs very closely. So we were in for a shock when we wandered over last night and realized that those giant greeny-blue ovals weren’t out-of-season melons, but honest-to-goodness emu eggs. What’s more, they’re local.

More photos of outlandish eggs, fresh from the farm, below…

Does your Whole Foods have a local egg bar? Ours does, complete with little wire baskets stuffed with dried moss to keep your eggs gently cushioned. We kid you not.

There are plenty of white and brown eggs from locally raised Ohio chickens.

Here’s a half dozen sampler of several varieties.

There were also miniature quail eggs (which we’ve blogged about before – so tiny and delicious!)…

…and hefty goose eggs, which our shopping companion snatched up to cook for breakfast. We’re curious to see how it’s cooked!

And then there were the famous emu eggs! So beautiful. We loved seeing these in the Gourmet slideshow we mentioned at Easter, but we didn’t think to see one in person so soon. These and the ostrich eggs up top were $19.99 each. They are both from locally raised Ohio birds – just like the chickens. Except larger, of course.

Our final basket, nestled in the cart as if we’d just been picking fresh eggs out from under hens in the chicken coop. We find the basket picturesque yet slightly ridiculous. The cashier put the eggs in a small paper carton when we checked out – why couldn’t we just do that ourselves?

Oh well – it’s part of the Whole Foods Market experience we suppose! We are itching now to go back and buy an ostrich or emu egg. How would you cook one of these, and what would you use it for? Do you have any stories to tell about any of these kinds of eggs?