Wednesday, November 4, 2009

EGGS: free range vs. cage free


Can you tell which is which? 
The one on the left is "cage free".  I'm not sure what that means- they probably run around in a giant chicken house, but they clearly are not eating what the chickens on the right are eating.  The egg on the right is from the dairy farm chickens that run around the barnyard all day eating bugs and picking through cow poop.  Bright orange with a firm tall white compared to the thin runny white on the cage free egg which obviously sat around in the store for a while.  Sadly the dairy chickens have been being ornery lately- not laying well or laying outside the hen house so their eggs can't be found.  I'm "jonesing" for those rich yellow yolks, the others just can't compare.  I keep threatening to set-up a hen house all my own, but it sounds like too much work.  Maybe next spring....

4 comments:

Randy Emmitt said...

Maria,

Meg and I have been eating Fickle Creek Farm eggs since spring. Expensive but they taste so much better. We visited the farm during the Farm Tour, the chickens run freely in the field with two huge guard dogs to protect them.

Anonymous said...

There is definite difference in taste as well as colour! Have you noticed egg shell being thicker and tougher in free range eggs?

Maria Hitt said...

Randy - thanks for the tip- I'll try them, have not been that impressed with most eggs even from the farmers market.
Vrtlarica- yes the shells are very thick!

Stew said...

Maria, this is so true. I ran into Frank Latta at the fair a couple of years ago, and asked him what Cage-free meant. It did indeed mean that they're inside a building of some kind. He said that he couldn't make a living on the eggs if he let them free range. Better than caged, at least, but the bright orange of my friend Jamie's eggs outshines every other egg I've had before.