A Pennsylvania man got a little something extra in his meal while he was on vacation.
Scott Overland of Phoenixville, Pennsylvania, was reportedly with his family at Salt Air restaurant in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware, when he found a purple pearl in his order of clams at dinner one night.
"It was the end of the dish and I felt something hard and crunchy as I was eating," Overland told FOX 5 DC.
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Overland said that when he looked at the pearl, he at first thought it was a bead or a piece of candy.
"…it was a bright lavender – almost purple, and we had not heard of clams producing purple, so didn’t know this was a possibility," he said.
Overland and his family realized it was a pearl when they looked back at the shell and saw an indentation where something had been growing, FOX 5 DC reported.
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"We put it in there and it was a perfect fit," Overland told the station.
After a Google search, Overland discovered pearls can cost anywhere from $600 to $1,600 depending on their size and shape, FOX 5 DC reported.
These kinds of pearls – grown in a species of hard saltwater clams native to New England – are "exceptionally rare," according to the International Gem Society (IGS).
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Only about one in 5,000 shells of this kind of clam produces a pearl and even those that are made are either poor quality or damaged, the IGS wrote on its website.
Overland told FOX 5 DC that he plans to get his pearl appraised but still wants to keep it.
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He said that his family is thrilled with their souvenir.
"We went on vacation expecting to bring back a T-shirt or a mug, our kids got some hermit crabs, we didn't expect to come back with something like this," Overland said.