Erik Menk was known as one of the fiercest, most fearless players to ever see action in the PBA.

But when he took on the challenge of eating a balut for the first time, the former Barangay Ginebra center really felt some major pain.

“I’ve been in the Philippines now for almost 20 years, I’ve heard a lot about balut. People ask me all the time because I didn’t grow up here,” the US-born Menk said in a video he posted on YouTube on Monday.

Like many Filipinos who didn’t grow up in the Philippines, he needed to summon a lot of courage to consume the duck embryo.

His running commentary was a thing of comic beauty.

“Sounds like a complicated process,” Menk said, as he explained how the egg was to be eaten.

“Dude, it’s like black. Is it supposed to be like that?” as he cracked the balut open to expose the avian fetus.

After taking what looked like a few minutes to gulp it all down (with the help of beer, of course), Menk, looking ready to faint at this point in the video, was a picture of relief.

“I don’t even know how to describe that . . . It wasn’t horrible, I didn’t feel like throwing up,” said Menk, who is busy these days doing personal multimedia work on his website.

Is an encore due any time soon? Don’t get your hopes up.

“I don’t know if it’ll be a regular in the Menk diet,” he said.

(For more sports coverage, visit the ABS-CBN Sports website.)