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Over the past two months, I have been eating eggs every single day. Boiled eggs specifically because I have been trying to lower down my calorie intake and increase protein while avoiding red meat at the same time. So my diet mainly consists of fish, eggs, fruits, and vegetables. I still eat cheese though and bread but I would prefer wheat bread and if ever I eat rice, I would prefer the black rice although I have tried brown rice before I didn't like it compared to black rice!

When we bought black rice, we really thought it was way expensive. Priced at Php 200+ for two kilos but then upon cooking it, surprisingly, both James and I thought its pretty the same with white rice's price because a cup of black rice will produce the same amount of 2 cups of cooked white rice! But this is a better healthier option!

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But this blog isn't about the types of rice, perhaps I will be creating a separate blog for that but for today, I would like to talk about eggs simply because we have been trying out different types of eggs and there are obvious differences and I would like to share that you today. Plus, we are close to also starting up our own free-range chicken and egg business which we hope to happen by 2019! Isn't that exciting?

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Today's blog will be about how to know if the eggs are fresh, the differences between the brown and white eggs as well as the tiny thin line between the caged, cage free and free range chicken laying eggs.

Chicken Eggs, Know Them!

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While a chicken egg may be a small thing, you'll be surprised with the nutrients and protein content it contains. It is less in calorie and fat but it is full of protein so those who are conscious with their calorie intake are advised to eat eggs instead of that high-calorie food.

But the question is how to figure that an egg is good for you? There are lots of eggs available in the grocery stores and COOPs but you must know how to distinguish which is better and which is not any more safe for eating.

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To figure out if the egg you bought from the market is fresh, you might want to place it in a bowl of water. If it sinks and lays on one side, they are fresh and that's how we want our eggs to be. If they sink but stand on their end, they are still okay for eating, however, if the eggs float, this means they are not good anymore and may cause bad stomach. So always be careful when dealing with eggs. Don't scramble them right away because they might not anymore be fresh. This I learned from my grandparents and was testified by the internet!

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I always boil the eggs we buy in the market and mind you, all of these eggs sink and stand on their end. So it is very obvious that these on the market have been sitting on the grocery shelves for weeks!

With that, James and I really want to produce our own eggs so we can provide for our everyday needs and perhaps use it for business too!

Brown or White Eggs?

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Have you also asked the same before? Is the brown egg healthier than the white ones? Why is it brown and why is the other white?

Actually, they should taste the same. The colors are just because of the different breeds of chicken laying those eggs.

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My husband and brother in law are managing their backyard gamefowl business but it is most likely becoming a hobby now because they aren't really selling their birds instead, they a lot them for games they personally join in during the fighting seasons.

However, managing a gamefowl farm and having an egg laying types of chicken is very similar. In fact, the latter is easier and less complicated. Gamefowl breeding is very particular in terms of the breed of each chicken. They have to know what breed is the hen and the rooster so documentation is important.

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In the chicken egg laying business, knowing the breed is also as important because the type of eggs will depend on them. However, in today's market, brown eggs have now shown signs of increasing market demand. They are also more expensive than the white eggs. But then again, the healthier option can't be determined by the color of the eggs but how the hens which are producing the eggs. This takes me to the next point.

Caged, Cage Free or Free Range?

There was a little argument if I should get a tray of cage free or free range eggs while James and I were at the grocery store one Saturday evening.

So which should be the best egg?

Caged eggsbasically means these chicken hens were placed inside a cage, they have no physical activity, the producers and suppliers don't usually add any label on their trays if they are caged. I personally have been avoiding these types of eggs. They are the least to have nutrients because they only eat what's being fed to them.

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Cage-free labeled eggs are usually the same to those caged ones in terms of feeding because they are still eating the same feeds given to the hens except that they are not 100% caged. They may have physical activity but they are limited activities, they are still placed in an area fenced where they can roam around but they only find very little nutrients from the ground.

Image credits: npr

Free range chicken hens are those which provides the best types of eggs because they tend to get physical activities from all the scratching and roaming around the entire farm area.

Aside from physical activities, they have huge tendencies of being able to get extra nutrients from what they find on the grounds like plants, shells, worms and everything else. These components help in producing bright colored yolks!

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But the only downside though of buying free-range eggs is that they are a bit pricey. Which is why, for James and myself, we can see a huge potential in this free-range egg business. Aside from it can provide us fresh free-range eggs, they are also healthy to be eaten.

 

  This blog entry was written and published by Jean Beltran-Figues for bitlanders.com.