I buy organic eggs from Elizabeth on Victoria Avenue in Vineland. Every once in a while I get an egg with a little poop on it. It doesn't wash off very well. I wondered about this, and got the explanation yesterday from Christine who grooms Millie - she raises chickens.
Should you wash chicken eggs after being collected from the hen house?
The simple answer is "No". Eggs are laid with a natural coating on the shell called the “bloom” or “cuticle”. This coating is the first line of defense in keeping air and bacteria out of the egg. Eggshells are porous, so when you wash them you’re removing that natural barrier.
Why would you not wash the eggs? Unwashed eggs can sit on your kitchen counter at room temperature for a couple of weeks and they’ll still be edible. But once they’ve touched water, they need to be refrigerated. Store-bought eggs have been cleaned so they need to go in the fridge.
And then there are rules of thumb when washing the eggs. This comes from a website:
"You want the water to be warmer than the egg so it doesn’t suck the bacteria in, and you want to do it under running water. You don’t want to put them in a bowl of water and then start washing them. It should be running water so they’re not sitting in the dirty water," she says. "Then, just let them dry and refrigerate them. Personally, I don’t wash my eggs until just before we eat them."
Another site has you spray them with diluted bleach-water solution to sanitize them. The MasterClass site says to spray them with mineral oil to keep them from losing moisture in the refrigerator.
Some things to not do?
Avoid using dish soap or scented cleaning solutions.
Don't wash in cold water as it creates a vacuum and pulls bacteria into the eggs.
Don't soak eggs in water - again it will open the egg up to bacteria.
Don't allow the eggs to stay wet for the same reason.
It's complicated but interesting to find out about farm life when you are an urbanite.
Our first chicken/rooster was at The Good Earth restaurant pecking around on the vineyard side The second was a chicken named Elvis at Gate to Plate farm. He was strutting along.
Is there a Guinness Record every single day of the year? Yesterday's record was a man snapping 98 pencils in 60 seconds. The report claims that it is incredible that he's not the first man to attempt the record. He beat the previous record of 90 pencils.
And on Friday the 13th, a B.C. bookstore in Victoria attempted to set the world record on the tallest book stack. Did they do it? No news. So that would mean it is unlikely. It is hard to tell - there are so many stacks of book records. There's even the tallest stack of Guinness World Records books.
And how many people were at Port Dover for Friday the 13th? There were only 75,000 people in Port Dover yesterday. Attendance was 'light'. The next Friday the 13th is in December, so no records will be broken then.
Who was born and died on Friday the 13th? Arnold Schoenberg, the composer. He was reported to be terrified of the number all his life.
Salt Spring Island is the home of David Wood Salt Spring Island Cheese. Here are scenes from the farm.
