Information about Swiftlet’s Nest

Swiftlet’s Nest refers to the saliva produced by the Swiftlet birds, while making its nest. The saliva acts as glue, pasted to form a thin flaky wall in the nest. When the saliva comes in contact with air, it hardens and a white Swiftlet’s Nest cup is formed. The entire process takes around 30 days.

1. What is the history of Swiftlet’s Nest consumption culture?

Value of Swiftlet’s Nest today derived from the belief and proven result from human application for almost a thousand years in the traditional Chinese medicine. Traced back to Tang dynasty 618-907 AD, the Emperor ordered General Chen Hue to travel the world in the ship and to look for land and food. It is when General Chen Hue went for a long voyage visiting the South Asian Sea Islands where he found the new peculiar food taken by the island villagers. He loaded this new food from bird saliva into his ship and wandered into farther sea. When he came back to his homeland China, people were surprised to see him and his crew looked so healthy and vibrant. Skin glowed. Since then Swiftlet’s Nest is considered as rare royal food. Chinese traditional medicine later on confirmed benefits to health and youth after a long record of real efficacy. Nowadays, more Chinese people can afford this magical food and are enjoying the benefit for their own health and their love ones. It is a ‘must take’ food for pregnant woman and mother as well as for people recovered from sickness or operation. Today with advance scientific technology, Swiftlet’s Nest has been tested and proven of its benefits. There are hundreds of reports done by scientist in many countries which finally explained the Myth about Swiftlet’s Nest to the new generation.

Information about Swiftlet’s Nest

2. What exactly is this Swiftlet’s Nest?

Swiftlet’s Nest refers to the saliva produced by the Swiftlet birds, while making its nest. The saliva acts as glue, pasted to form a thin flaky wall in the nest. When the saliva comes in contact with air, it hardens and a white Swiftlet’s Nest cup is formed. The entire process takes around 30 days.
The saliva, though moist and in liquid form when produced, will harden into a type of strands. The saliva is considered the cement that holds the entire nest together, and the strands are interwoven throughout the nest. The strands should look almost completely gapless in order to protect the chick during reproduction. Woven into the strands are bits of impurities or items which must be picked out prior to consumption. These impurities can include twigs, mud, or feathers.
A Swiftlet’s Nest is built primarily for laying eggs and housing the baby Swiftlet. After the eggs have been laid and hatched, the baby Swiftlet will remain in the nest until it is able to fly away independently. The nest then becomes abandoned and will never be re-used. If not harvested, scavengers such as ants, lizards and cockroaches will consume the Swiftlet’s Nest.

3. Knowing the owner of the nest.

Bird that builds nest from her saliva has a scientific name called ‘Collocalia’. There are two types of Swiftlet’s Nest considered by its origin, cave nest and house nest. Both types have the same scientific molecule structure. They may be different in shape, color, moisture and minerals due to the environment where the nest is located but the saliva scientific structure is, in fact, the same.
Collocalia will start preparing their saliva nest to lay eggs when they start mating three times a year. After about 90 days, the baby and the mother will fly away. Collocalia sleeps like a bat using their feet hanging. Their nest is only for laying egg and taking care of small birds before they fly away. They do not need their nest to ‘live in’. When they will mate again, they will then build another nest. They do not normally use the old nest to hatch their eggs. Each nest takes around 20 days to complete. The nest we took from each period was abandoned.

Chinese Swiftlet’s Nest is one bizarrely cool dish to get tweeting about

Recipe

Cooking Time 0-30 minutes
Number of Ingredients 0-5

The Swiftlet’s Nest is the word

Swiftlet’s Nest may sound like a crazy Chinese urban legend of a dish, you know, one so bonkers it can’t be real or it’s just a funny lost-in-translation name, but the delicacy is indeed an authentic one. Rather from being made from twigs and bits of moss, they’re made from the hardened saliva from Swiftlet’s Nest and dissolved in a broth.
Head to SeeWoo or Royal Dragon to get your bowl of delicious Swiftlet’s Nest
If that still doesn’t sound too appetising, don’t worry, today they’re harvested entirely for human consumption and super-high in minerals like calcium, magnesium and potassium. Believed to enhance the immune system, aid digestion and improve libido Swiftlet’s Nest has been keeping the Chinese healthy (and horny) since 500 AD during the Tang dynasty. A dish for the elite, it was only imperial nobility who dined on the unique broth. According to legend it was the great admiral Cheng Ho who bought the Swiftlet’s Nest to Southeast Asia for the Chinese Emperor.
These days, whilst still a rare delicacy, Swiftlet’s Nest is easily accessible for mere mortals. In Chinatown you can find the sacred dish at Gerrard Street’s Royal Dragon or if you want to prepare it at home, dried nests can be bought from SeeWoo supermarket on Lisle Street.
Here’s how to make your Swiftlet’s Nest.

METHOD:

• Soak the Swiftlet’s Nest for 6 hours or leave overnight until it has softened and expanded
• Remove and chop into portions, allocate 15g per person
• Add the portions to the chicken stock with the ginger and oil and stew for 20 minutes over heat until the nests have dissolved
• Add seasoning or adjust stock levels to taste then it’ll be ready to serve!