One of the first people I met in my town after moving here was the egg lady. Everybody knows her and she delivers eggs on Main Street from her farm that’s only a couple blocks away. She’s not exactly a farmer, she’s a flight attendant, but she has a large farm and about a dozen chickens. Everyone in town expects her to continue delivering eggs, just like everyone expects me to keep running a bed and breakfast. The woman that lived in my house before me ran a B&B here for 40 years. So I guess the egg lady and I have this thing in common of providing a town service on the side, but also she needs to get rid of her eggs.
If you want healthy eggs, don’t believe the “free range,” “uncaged,” or “natural,” advertising on egg cartons at the grocery store – it doesn’t mean much and gets people to pay more for cheap eggs. “Free range” could mean a door is opened after the chickens have been trained to stay inside. “Uncaged” could still mean they’re crammed in a room with tens of thousands of other chickens. I’m weary of the egg cartons that say the chickens are “vegetarian” because chickens out in a field eat worms and bugs. If they’re vegetarian, they must be trapped inside being fed who-knows-what – oh yeah, “high quality grain” (i.e. corn).
When I was a kid, I watched my brother put a raw egg in his milkshakes. Now the CDC strongly advises consumers to avoid recipes using raw eggs, including Caesar salad dressing, lemon pie, Hollandaise sauce, raw cookie dough, even soft-boiled eggs, and sunny-side up eggs.[1] Yeah, if you’re paying $1 a dozen you better not eat them raw. Our egg lady charges $3 per dozen which I’ve learned is a steal because they’re the best eggs, you don’t have to be afraid to use them raw, and they’re good for you.
A pasture poultry farmer had eggs tested which showed 40% more vitamin A, up to ten times more omega-3 fatty acids, 50% more folate (a B vitamin), and 60% more vitamin B12, while having 10% less fat, and 34% less cholesterol. (The pasture broiler chickens had 50% more vitamin A, 100% more omega-3s, 21% less total fat, 30% less saturated fat, and 28% fewer calories.)[2]
Caesar Salad Dressing
1 egg yolk – yum!
3 T extra virgin olive oil
2 T lemon or lime juice
1 T Dijon mustard (or ¼ t dry mustard if you don’t have brown mustard)
½ t Worcestershire
1 crushed garlic clove – not too huge
Whisk the egg yolk, then whisk in the next five ingredients.
I get the multipack of anchovies at Costco and the kids put them on their romaine lettuce but I don’t mix it into the dressing because I don’t like the saltiness. Sometimes I whisk a spoonful of mayo into the dressing if I want it creamier.
[1] Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, CDC Features, Tips to Reduce Your Risk of Salmonella from Eggs, April 25, 2011.
[2] #101 Jo Robinson Pasture Perfect: The Far-Reaching Benefits of Choosing Meat, Eggs, and Dairy Products from Grass-Fed Animals, Vashon Island Press, 2004.
