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Eggs Not Always What They're Cracked Up to Be

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Re: Eggs Not Always What They're Cracked Up to Be

#131

Post by kalleboo »

In contrast, here are the regulations in Sweden (probably similar elsewhere in the EU):

* Battery cages: Banned

* "Caged hens": Cage size must be at least 750 cm^2. Must have sand, a nest, and a stick to sit on.

* "Free range indoors": Floor space must be at least 1,111 cm^2 per hen. 1/3 of the floor area must be sand or similar. Must have access to a nest, at least 15 cm of stick to sit on.

* "Free range outdoors": At least 1,111 cm^2 space per hen. Must have access to an outdoors area of at least 4m^2 per hen. Same sand/nest/sitting stick rules as indoors.

* "Organic": At least 1,664 cm^2 space per hen. Outdoors area of at least 4m^2 per hen. Outdoors area must have grass growing. 1/3 of floor area must have sand or similar, must have a nest, must have a sitting stick of at least 18 cm. Must be fed with organic feed.

* "KRAV Organic certified": Organic + Must have access to root vegetables to eat at. The farm can't be leaking stuff from the fertilizer into the surrounding nature.

Many of the large supermarket chains have stopped selling caged eggs completely, which now make up less than 10% of sold eggs. Around 12% are organic.

Swedish eggs are 100% salmonella-free.

Re: Eggs Not Always What They're Cracked Up to Be

#132

Post by mcmancini »

ars wrote: post #128
mcmancini wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your advice seems to contradict the FDA: http://www.fda.gov/Food/ResourcesForYou/Consumers/ucm077342.... What is the basis for your claims?

Almost every other country except the US does not refrigerate eggs. I've personally kept US eggs unrefrigerated for 2 months with no problems - none of them were spoiled. Refrigeration is mainly for freshness (i.e. yolk firmness). It's not necessary to prevent spoiling.

"Almost every other country" doesn't wash their eggs, which strips the protective cuticle that allows eggs to remain safe at room temperature. They also immunize against salmonella.

Again, do you have any sort of credible scientific basis behind your claims?

Re: Eggs Not Always What They're Cracked Up to Be

#134

Post by minor_nitwit »

archagon wrote: post #31
Aloisius wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The color of an egg yolk is based on what the chicken ate and has no bearing on how idyllic their lives were. There are plenty of pasture raised chickens without the deep orange color because the plant material around them (you can get nearly white colored yolks from a hen that has literally miles of pasture around them). If there a lot of capsicum peppers around for instance, the yolks will turn almost red. How firm…

Well, yeah, but I imagine "what the chicken ate" and "how idyllic their lives were" are pretty closely related. In any case, I've never once found a firm orange yolk in my eggs — supermarket, farmer's market, or otherwise. Joel is probably doing something right here. (Or maybe his eggs are just really fresh, I don't know.)

Just really fresh I think. Backyard chicken eggs from my coworker are like this. I don't know what the big deal about the firmness of the yolk is, but I'm not a pro chef. Tastes like an egg to me. When she gives me eggs, they last a really long time. She says that the way to tell if their old is by how fragile the yolk is. If it breaks going into the pan, then it's bad.

Re: Eggs Not Always What They're Cracked Up to Be

#135

Post by 3pt14159 »

kalleboo wrote: post #131

In contrast, here are the regulations in Sweden (probably similar elsewhere in the EU): * Battery cages: Banned * "Caged hens": Cage size must be at least 750 cm^2. Must have sand, a nest, and a stick to sit on. * "Free range indoors": Floor space must be at least 1,111 cm^2 per hen. 1/3 of the floor area must be sand or similar. Must have access to a nest, at least 15 cm of stick to sit on. * "Free range outdoors":…

1111 cm^2 isn't that much. It's only a square foot of space... I used to raise chickens, they need at least 4 times that.

Re: Eggs Not Always What They're Cracked Up to Be

#136

Post by Cyther606 »

dubfan wrote: post #93
Cyther606 wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For those of you undecided on the GMO question: If you do nothing else this month, I implore you to watch The World According to Monsanto [1]. A mind bogglingly awesome documentary featuring a copious amount of boots on the ground and expert testimonial. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N6_DbVdVo-k

I place "The World According To Monsanto" in the same league as "Zeitgeist" and "Loose Change". Great if you want affirmation of your worldview, pretty underwhelming if you're interested in facts.

I'll take my facts from doctors, university professors, whistleblowers and affected families over corporate mouthpieces any day, thank you very much. Experts interviewed include:

- Robert Bellé, Ph.D., French National Center for Scientific Research

- Dan Glickman, US Secretary of Agriculture, 1995-2000

- John Hoffman, Vice President of the American Soybean Association

- Richard Burroughs, D.V.M, FDA Veterinarian, 1979-1989

- James Maryanski, Ph.D., Biotechnology Coordinator at the FDA, 1985-2006

- Michael Hansen, Ph.D., Senior Staff Scientist of the Consumers Union

- Samuel Epstein, Ph.D., President of the Cancer Prevention Coalition

- David Carpenter, Ph.D., University of Albany

Re: Eggs Not Always What They're Cracked Up to Be

#137

Post by kalleboo »

3pt14159 wrote: post #135
kalleboo wrote: post #131

In contrast, here are the regulations in Sweden (probably similar elsewhere in the EU): * Battery cages: Banned * "Caged hens": Cage size must be at least 750 cm^2. Must have sand, a nest, and a stick to sit on. * "Free range indoors": Floor space must be at least 1,111 cm^2 per hen. 1/3 of the floor area must be sand or similar. Must have access to a nest, at least 15 cm of stick to sit on. * "Free range outdoors":…

1111 cm^2 isn't that much. It's only a square foot of space... I used to raise chickens, they need at least 4 times that.

Yeah, in contrast, a sheet of A4 paper is 620 cm^2. So they have less than two pieces of paper to stand on.

Re: Eggs Not Always What They're Cracked Up to Be

#138

Post by krrrh »

archagon wrote: post #21

The description in "The Omnivore's Dilemma" of egg yolks from idyllically pasture-raised chickens is forever stuck in my memory. "Between stops, Art mentioned that Joel’s eggs usually gave him his foot in the door when trying to land a new account. We stopped in at one such prospect, a newly opened restaurant called the Filling Station. Art introduced himself and presented the chef with a brochure and a dozen eggs. T…

As others have noted in this thread the "muscle tone" of eggs is largely affected by freshness. This is something that you really begin to notice with [sous vide cooked eggs](http://www.seriouseats.com/2013/10/sous-vide-101-all-about-e...) where the distinction between the 'tight' and 'loose' whites can have dramatic effects.

*"As eggs age, both the yolk and the tight white membranes will get thinner and more fragile. At the same time, the tight white will leak moisture into the loose white, diluting the loose white further and causing it to become even runnier."

Re: Eggs Not Always What They're Cracked Up to Be

#139

Post by shalmanese »

Given how much HN loves to bring up the studies that show people fail at tasting wine, it's surprising that nobody has talked about how double blind studies consistently reveal that there's no perceptible taste difference between different types of eggs (once color is controlled for):

Washington Post:

> The egg industry has been conducting blind tastings for years. The only difference is that they don't use dish-towel blindfolds; they have special lights that mask the color of the yolks. "If people can see the difference in the eggs, they also find flavor differences," Curtis says. "But if they have no visual cues, they don't."

> Only one factor can markedly affect an egg's taste, and that is the presence of strong flavors in the feed. "Omega-3 eggs can sometimes have a fishy taste if the hens are fed marine oils,"

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/06...

Serious Eats:

> It was pretty clear evidence that as far as eggs go, the mindset of the taster has far more bearing on the flavor of the egg than the egg itself.

http://www.seriouseats.com/2010/08/what-are-the-best-eggs-ca...

Journal of Product and Brand Management:

> Respondents indicated that darker yolk color results in better taste, whereas results of a blind taste test indicated that consumers were not able to distinguish any significant difference in the taste of different types of eggs and yolk colors (Fearne and Lavelle, 1996b). Similarly, respondents indicated that brown regular and specialty eggs are tastier than white regular eggs. Fearne and Lavelle (1996b) reported that in a blind test consumers could not make a distinction between the tastes of regular and specialty eggs.

http://ps.oxfordjournals.org/content/90/5/1088.full

It's an extremely potent example of confirmation bias since even people who are normally quite science minded and skeptical somehow find loopholes that exempt their personal experience as not conforming to the data when confronted with evidence that their fancy eggs taste no better.

Re: Eggs Not Always What They're Cracked Up to Be

#140

Post by antoaravinth »

tiglionabbit wrote: post #34
archagon wrote: post #21

The description in "The Omnivore's Dilemma" of egg yolks from idyllically pasture-raised chickens is forever stuck in my memory. "Between stops, Art mentioned that Joel’s eggs usually gave him his foot in the door when trying to land a new account. We stopped in at one such prospect, a newly opened restaurant called the Filling Station. Art introduced himself and presented the chef with a brochure and a dozen eggs. T…

I went to whole foods and bought a bunch of different brands of eggs and cracked them at home to inspect them. I noticed a big difference between the ones that said "pastured" from all of the others. These were usually the orangest and firmest. The yellowest and weakest were the "omega 3 flax fed" ones. Words like "cage free" and "free range" didn't seem to make a difference.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omega-3_fatty_acid#Health_effec...
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