This discussion reminded me of when I was a little kid. I remember asking my mother how you could tell if an egg had gone bad. She told me you can't miss it, it stinks like crazy. I can honestly say I've never met a rotten egg in all my years. This is what I found in an egg shell that sat in the back of my mother's refrigerator for about 4 years. Yolk smooth, shiny, and hard as a rock, white completely gone.
Here in the DR I buy farm fresh eggs for $8.55 per 100 and they sit on my counter till I use them normally about two weeks.
That's crazy!!! Now I want to set some eggs aside and open one each year, just to see. And you raise an interesting point. They add a sulfur smell to natural gas so it has an odor to detect leaks, wells need to be disinfected when the water stinks of hydrogen sulfide, and it's all referred to as a "rotten egg smell." But I don't know I've ever smelled bad eggs, either. Yet we all [think we] know what is meant as though it's a common occurence. A quick peek at a post on BackyardChicken.com indicates that they don't know for certain what causes this, but they suspect that rotten eggs happen when the hen lays one in some weird place (under the neighbor's hedges) and it sits in the heat for months, and/or perhaps has the rain wash off the bloom. One woman had one rotten egg out of the 3 she found together under a shrub.
At under a dime each that's one heck of an economical meal, no matter how many you eat. Heck, the "expensive" fresh eggs I'm buying are still only 20ยข apiece.
I usually eat 4-6 per day not hard fried. The brown egg is a fake which we have a lot of fun with when a person visits I ask them do they get any of these brown eggs and I pick it up and hand it to them and before they grab it I drop it on the floor and watch their reaction quite funny. My breakfast most morning is bacon and eggs 4-5 strips of bacon and 3-4 eggs. Great life.
You and I have similar senses of humor. If I lived near you, I'd substitute a real brown egg for that brown rubber one...then patiently wait. I like my eggs poached and over easy. Maybe soft-boiled every once in a while. You gotta have runny yolk to dip the toast into. I have been eating more eggs now that I have access to the fresh ones, but nowhere near your volume.
@John Brunner Here is another hint for you when I got into vitamins and minerals I looked for places to get them cheap but good and calcium seem to be one very important. I took egg shells cleaned and then dried in oven smashed up put in the coffee grinder and ground to a power, then put into capsules and use them as a supplement. 95% calcium the other is iron copper and zinc. I do not throw much away.
Thank you! That's a great idea! I was big into supplements for quite a while after I quit drinking. Did tons of research. Worked with my doctor, etc. Had quite the extensive regime. I was taking CO Q10 well before it was recommended as a statin companion. Regarding using shells...I read that some of the chicken hobbyists feed the calcium-rich shells back to their chickens (rather than buying supplemental oyster shell feed.) They grind them up first so the chickens do not associate their own egg shells with food. It's amazing that there's a use for everything.
So I went to the farm across the street to see if they had eggs (they did). They gave me more data: >Chickens tend to molt annually based on their first laying cycle, not at a specific time of year. >>His chickens' molt cycles are intentionally staggered. >Not all breeds cease laying when they molt. >>Molting hens may lay less because of the demand on their systems to grow new feathers. >"Grazing" chickens are going to find their molt to be less severe and shorter lived than cooped chickens. >Productivity declines during the winter because there are fewer daylight hours in which to feed, so they eat less. >>Lower daily caloric intake = Reduced egg output >He always has eggs to sell. He just has fewer of them in the winter. But production never ceases. >While younger hens are more likely to lay double-yolked eggs in general, this trait is also breed-specific. >>He has a breed of hen that lays double-yolked eggs well into their third year of laying. I'm so relieved to know I won't have my supply disrupted. And this guy cleared up some misinformation.
I like eating Cobb salad with chicken and hard boiled eggs in it so I can wax philosophical as I dine.
@Maggie Rose My maternal grandma soaked eggshells in water on the back porch. The stink was indescribable! Especially in summer, when the porch was opened to the inside...... Frank