Cracking eggs.

Battery hens are banned but there are now "enriched cage" birds, which does not sound a whole lot better. Quite a few supermarkets sell these along with free range and some sell organic. When you read about the conditions that some of the "free range" hens are kept in, ie with trimmed beaks, it makes you think twice about buying any mass produced eggs at all.

They’re expensive shysal but I’d rather pay the extra because the hens are (I hope) free range. Their health and diet must be good because the eggs are as I mentioned, so like the ones my free range, very well fed hens provided us with. I had three garden hens, each with their own personality. I could sit and just enjoy watching them. The most confident hen turned on my ten week old pup, who’d escaped the kitchen and decided to run at the hens barking. She turned, waved her wings and took a step towards him. He ran back into the kitchen

I noticed some extra cheap eggs in Tesco last week and saw that they were from caged birds. I don't know if that is the same as battery, but I certainly would not buy them. Next time I am near a Sainsbury I will try the Clarence Court. Thank you for the recommendation.

HannahLL, I buy those Clarence Court free range from Sainsbury's. they are the only supermarket eggs I' ve found that remotely resemble the eggs my own free range hens provided us with.
I do understand vegan friends who won't use or eat anything from animal products. I'm not there myself and still eat some chicken and lamb from our local butcher as I know the creatures have a decent life before slaughter.

I thought keeping hens in batteries had been banned. Does anyone know if this is so? In the late 50's I nearly had a nervous breakdown when I visited a farm and saw this cruel practice.

Is there a difference when stored in the fridge, or using an egg from a bowl kept in room temperature, I havent even thought about that, we have some in the fridge some in the kitchen in a bowl, must check tomorrow.

I always buy at least free range and mostly organic but have just discovered Clarence Court free range at Sainsburys. The shells are very strong and the darkest brown I've seen in years with deep orange yolks. Lovely.

Yes I have noticed that, whenever I crack an egg lately I end up fishing bits out of the bowl. I have free range eggs, may be its to do with the feed.

Free range eggs are fine-as the birds get to scratch around in the dirt they eat bits which helps the shells to be strong I used to keep chickens when I had a larger house with big garden & I could never buy an egg from a battery or even barn fed chicken now. They are such sociable birds with individual characters.
I'd rather at less eggs if I had to than buy eggs from birds with such a terrible way of life.

Contrary to many I keep eggs in the warmest part of my fridge and find they don't shatter when cracking. What ever I need using them for dictates whether they can be cracked and used straight from the fridge or cracked and then covered and used at a more even temperature whatever the recipe suggests.

You're not alone - the shells on most eggs bought in supermarkets are definitely thinner than they used to be.

And it is all very well telling us we ought to buy free-range or organic eggs, but on my pension, I cannot afford to - and that goes for most organic foodstuffs, not just eggs.

lollee, don't knock it until you try it.

I'm not a great lover of eggs, and am always getting bits of shell in the egg, having to fish it out... and that really puts me off. I thought I was just heavy handed!!
Also I can't bear the 'cordy' bit and get this out, and it seems that there is blood spots or other random looking bits in the eggs now, and most end up down the sink!!

As you can imagine having a guest house we get through dozens of eggs and sometimes the shells just disintegrate when you try to break them and it drives me crackers fishing out bits of shell.
I have found free range are the best though

I keep free range chickens - a dozen of them have half an acre so they're properly free range and get lots of grit and good organic food. But I do find the shells vary a lot - depends on the chicken I suppose and how good they are at re-processing calcium! And how old the chickens are too ... (It comes to us all!)

Surely battery farms have been outlawed, or so I thought.

Not sure hard boiling first is a good idea if you want fried, scrambled or poached lol. Not to mention if you are baking a cake!

Hard boil them first, problem solved.

A friend of ours keeps 'chooks' and we buy our eggs from her.
All her hens are ex battery birds, and now have a wonderful life, they're truly free range!
I loathe having to buy supermarket eggs when Judith's go off lay over winter, but will only buy organic then.
If everyone refused to buy cheap, intensively farmed eggs, hens would all have better lives!

It's due to poorly fed battery chickens.
shysal said that she bought the free range eggs.
However, they are not outside for long enough to peck up grit, etc, essential for forming hard shells.

Nanabilly, I don't buy eggs from battery hens. I will consider changing from free range to organic.

I crack eggs on the side of the bowl if I'm whisking them. If they are going into some sort of batter, I crack them with a knife. I don't know why, but I always do it this way.

I can’t understand people paying £10 for some gadget when you can easily crack on the side of basin or side of anything else I ve never used the knife method I think I d drop it

Try cracking one of these! You need a hammer and chisel ?

It's due to poorly fed battery chickens. They live on a very poor diet and are unhealthy and unhappy too.
They taste disgusting too.