Re: Re: Egg advice needed!

November 19, 2002

Unfortunately, here in NYC we don't have too many pet chicken owners ...hee hee!

(you live in Manhattan, right ?)

The best eggs I've found in the city have been from Amish at the Sat. farmers

market in Grand Army Plaza, Brooklyn. They are never more than a few days old

(so I'm told), and last time I checked, they weren't feeding their chickens soy.

They also have very bright yellow/orange yolks. You could check at the Wed.

market in Union Square. From the HFS, I buy the fertile organic happy hen brown

eggs. They are OK and don't smell/taste like rancid fish oil (yuck!).

Good luck!

----- Original Message -----

From: Dr. Marasco

Sent: Tuesday, November 19, 2002 1:57 PM

Subject: Re: Egg advice needed!

in virtually every community I've ever been in there are at

least a few yards with " eggs " or " brown eggs " for sale. Usually

these are just local folk with pet chickens. Some will be

acceptable some not but these are likely your best bet.

DMM

http://www.cedarcanyonclinic.com

> For the last couple years I've been buying Gold Circle Farms

eggs. They're

> organic and DHA-fortified, so as store-bought eggs go, I figured

they were

> pretty good. But they're from " vegetarian " chickens, and the feed

includes

> soy, so I've been on the lookout for a better source.

Unfortunately,

> that's gotten pretty urgent now.

>

> Lately I've had to go through carton after carton just to find a

dozen

> unbroken eggs. I'm not exaggerating -- maybe only a quarter of

the cartons

> on the shelf don't have any cracked eggs. Of course this could

just be

> because of changes in handling in the store or in shipping, but

the eggs

> are easier to crack open at home, and instead of cracking cleanly

in half,

> they tend to smash into bits, so I think the shells are getting

weaker.

>

> Worse yet, I'm starting to get eggs with yolks that taste as

though they've

> been injected with rancid fish oil. They're *horrible*, and it's

obviously

> a very unhealthy development. I just got another one for lunch,

and it

> ruined the other eggs and (pastured) bacon I was eating.

>

> Any ideas, anyone?

>

> -

November 19, 2002

Mike-

This would be great advice if I lived almost anywhere else. My family used

to buy eggs from just such a local person when I was a little kid, in fact,

and they were the best eggs I ever had. But I live in Manhattan, and there

are no yards and no chickens that I know of, or at least no chickens whose

eggs I'd want to eat. I got some eggs from a farmer's market once, but

they were terrible -- pale yolks, thin shells, fed soy and grains

only. Sadly enough, Hawthorne Valley Farm, one of NY's only sources of raw

milk, does offer pastured eggs, but only at their farm store, not at their

farmer's market booth. They won't bring eggs down here because of that

other outfit which sells the awful pale-yolked eggs.

> in virtually every community I've ever been in there are at

>least a few yards with " eggs " or " brown eggs " for sale. Usually

>these are just local folk with pet chickens. Some will be

>acceptable some not but these are likely your best bet.

-

November 19, 2002

-

>(you live in Manhattan, right ?)

Yup. Spanish Harlem, in fact.

>The best eggs I've found in the city have been from Amish at the Sat.

>farmers market in Grand Army Plaza, Brooklyn.

Hmm, is that easily accessible by subway? I don't know that it'd work

regularly, but maybe I could get eggs there sometimes at least.

>You could check at the Wed. market in Union Square.

I have. Unfortunately there only seems to be one supplier of eggs there,

and the eggs are very poor, with pale yolks.

> From the HFS, I buy the fertile organic happy hen brown eggs.

Fertile? Huh, I'll see if I can find any. Thanks.

>don't smell/taste like rancid fish oil (yuck!).

Yuck is the understatement of the year! I actually wound up getting a

SECOND one of those bad eggs on the same plate!

-

November 19, 2002

-

> From the HFS, I buy the fertile organic happy hen brown eggs. They are

> OK and don't smell/taste like rancid fish oil (yuck!).

I just came across something that makes Happy Hen sound pretty bad:

>>In June of 1992, I visited The Happy Hen, which is part of a family-owned

>>poultry and egg agribusiness called Pleasant View Farms in Lancaster

>>County, Pennsylvania. I was driven to a remote contract Amish farmstead

>>in Logantown, PA, where one of the three Happy Hen houses was located.

>>Through the netting at the front of the long barn I saw a sea of

>>chickens' faces looking out, as though they were smashed up against the

>>netting. Inside, the birds were wall to wall--6,8OO chickens with one

>>rooster for every hundred hens. They never set foot outside. They were

>>severely debeaked and their feathers were in terrible condition--

>>straggly, drab, and worn off. When I commented on how bad the chickens

>>looked, the owner said, " We have a saying: 'The rougher they look, the

>>better they lay.' " He said the fact that each hen lays 20 to 23 dozen

>>(25O) eggs a year proves they're treated well.

It's from a larger article at

http://www.all-creatures.org/articles/egg-freerange.html

Who knows how reliable the information is, and I don't suppose any other

store-bought eggs are necessarily much better, but still, it doesn't sound

good.

I picked up some Organic Valley eggs today, but I _really_ want to find

some good pastured eggs.

-

November 20, 2002

On Tue, 19 Nov 2002 17:57:34 -0500, you wrote:

> I was driven to a remote contract Amish farmstead

>>>in Logantown, PA, where one of the three Happy Hen houses was located.

>>>Through the netting at the front of the long barn I saw a sea of

>>>chickens' faces looking out, as though they were smashed up against the

>>>netting. Inside, the birds were wall to wall--6,8OO chickens with one

>>>rooster for every hundred hens.

There has been some stories on the internet about 'puppy mills' in Amish

country. I don't know if any of them are true, but the conditions described are

just as appalling for the dogs as this link you supplied says about the

chickens.

I am fortunate enough to have a source of fresh free range/no cage/ left out to

wander around chicken eggs, but when in an emergency I have had to buy eggs at

the HFS, I've found the choice is daunting. All the things done from vegetarian

feeding to adding supposedly healthy additives to increase the content of same.

The egg carton is as full of pretty pictures and possibly misleading statements

as any other commercially prepared food. So far I've not bought any bad eggs but

I have found small print after I got home that made me wish I had made a

different choice.

Mike E

November 20, 2002

,

Grand Army Plaza is on the 2/3--very accessible by subway, but quite a schlep

from East Harlem. Might not be worth it in the winter (summer is a MUCH better

time for farmer's markets). The folks I bought from in the summer (don't get

there too often) were not the same people who sell the eggs in Union Square, if

I remember--it was an Amish boy and his mother. I'll try to get there this Sat.

and I'll let you know if they are there again and if they'll be there through

the winter months.

----- Original Message -----

From: Idol

Sent: Tuesday, November 19, 2002 2:26 PM

Subject: Re: Re: Egg advice needed!

-

>(you live in Manhattan, right ?)

Yup. Spanish Harlem, in fact.

>The best eggs I've found in the city have been from Amish at the Sat.

>farmers market in Grand Army Plaza, Brooklyn.

Hmm, is that easily accessible by subway? I don't know that it'd work

regularly, but maybe I could get eggs there sometimes at least.

>You could check at the Wed. market in Union Square.

I have. Unfortunately there only seems to be one supplier of eggs there,

and the eggs are very poor, with pale yolks.

> From the HFS, I buy the fertile organic happy hen brown eggs.

Fertile? Huh, I'll see if I can find any. Thanks.

>don't smell/taste like rancid fish oil (yuck!).

Yuck is the understatement of the year! I actually wound up getting a

SECOND one of those bad eggs on the same plate!

-

November 20, 2002

Yeah, I read that too about Happy Hen. It concerns me, but then again, it was

on the PETA site. Maybe you are doing better with NT, but I feel that living in

NYC automatically compromises my diet from a health standpoint. But not from a

taste/variety/excitement standpoint!

----- Original Message -----

From: Idol

Sent: Tuesday, November 19, 2002 5:57 PM