Animal Foods Beyond the Usual Counter: Eggs, Cultured Dairy, Fish, Snails and Cured Beef

Duck eggs are larger than chicken eggs with a richer yolk and a thicker shell, which is why bakers prize them. The page also notes their role in Asian cooking as the base for salted duck eggs and for century eggs, so this first stop shows an egg that is preserved as often as it is eaten fresh.

Quail eggs are the smallest on this path and the page traces them across street food: tamago in Japanese sushi and bento, boiled snacks sold with beer in Vietnam, and the battered, deep-fried kwek-kwek of the Philippines. They are a delicacy in some Western markets but an ordinary, affordable food across much of Asia and South America.

Kefir leaves the egg behind for milk changed by living cultures. It comes from the North Caucasus and is made by adding kefir grains, a cluster of bacteria and yeast, to cow, goat or sheep milk, giving a tangy, lightly fizzy drink thinner than yogurt.

Skyr is an Icelandic cultured dairy product that is eaten like yogurt yet classed as a fresh sour milk cheese. The page cites medieval Icelandic sagas for its ancient roots and gives about 13 grams of protein per 100 grams for the plain kind, which comes from straining off the whey.

Creme fraiche is cream rather than milk, soured with bacterial starter cultures and holding 10 to 45 percent butterfat. Its high fat and lower acidity than sour cream let it finish hot sauces without curdling, so it works as a cooking ingredient as well as a topping.

Provolone moves from cultured dairy to a stretched-curd cheese made from cow milk and aged at least four months. The page separates sharp provolone piccante, made with goat lipase, from mild provolone dolce, made with calf lipase, and names Campania as its birthplace and Cremona as today's leading production area.

Grouper turns from land animals to the sea. The name covers a family of stout, large-mouthed marine fish, Epinephelidae, and the page records how regional names vary, from lapu-lapu in the Philippines to kerapu in Indonesia and Malaysia and hammour in the Persian Gulf.

Arctic char is a cold-water salmon relative described as the world's most northerly freshwater fish. It lives in alpine lakes and Arctic coastal waters from Canada and Greenland to Scandinavia, Siberia and Alaska, and some populations move between fresh and salt water.

Escargot is the French term for edible land snails, long considered poverty food before haute cuisine made them a delicacy. The page describes the eight to twelve day purge before cooking, names Helix pomatia as the most eaten species in France, and finishes with the garlic butter and special tongs of French service.

Bresaola ends the path with beef that is salted and air-dried for two to three months until it turns dark red. It comes from Valtellina in the Lombard Alps, is cut from the top round, and is sliced paper-thin as an antipasto at room temperature or slightly chilled.