Are conventional fertile eggs better than pastured organic infertile eggs?

[bharminder]

Hi how are you?

I am in the process of reading Aajonus' book We Want to Live, , and I keep seeing the recommendation for fertile eggs in different sections.

Usually I get the pastured organic infertile eggs. Now, the only fertile eggs I see, usually at WholeFoods, is regular, conventional, fertile eggs. The label doesn't have any details about food, living conditions, etc. Now, the pastured organic eggs seem to come from good conditions.


How important is the fertile part of the equation?


Thanks,
Bobby

[raw]

personally, i'd choose to buy conventional fertile eggs to eat. when i go to any farm and see the chickens and roosters are roaming around, i buy their eggs.

[bharminder]

Ah, thank you.

In my situation I don't know the living conditions of the animals for the fertile eggs.....

[MaximilianKohler]

Yeah, I've been wondering about this same thing... it seems you can either get free-range organic, or you can get free-range fertile... which would be the best?!!

[CitrusHigh]

If I had to choose between your two options, I'd go pastured infertile before conventional-fertile. It's more important to me that I'm supporting sustainable farming that looking out for my own health (even though the two go hand in hand, naturally)

You could always do a little legwork and contact the company selling the conventional eggs.

Alternatively or additionally you could buy a batch of each and in one bowl crack 3 or four of the one batch and in another bowl do the same, then inspect them visually. A healthy pastured egg should have these properties....

-A robustly colored yolk...Our eggs beat the pants off of any other eggs I've ever seen, some of them are so deep orange as to qualify as red.
-A strong and resilient yolk, joel salatin refers to this as muscle tone. You should be able to bat the yolk around a bit with a spoon without it breaking, or if the eggs are really good you could toss it (the yolk) back and forth in your hands without it easily breaking (this is rare and shows you have top tier eggs)
-A strong, smooth, monocolor shell.
-The white of a quality egg has certain properties as well but I can't remember what it is exactly you're looking for. It is one of the two, either really runny or very gelatinous.
-Some may have a small embryo in them, but usually this takes time to develop which means the eggs aren't very fresh, the embryo however is edible and not offputting IMHO.

Best for your spirit to support sustainable farming practices as opposed to conventional battery operations.

[laterade]

The duck eggs I am eating right now are both fertile and infertile.
I notice no difference. Yummy fats in both.

[donrad]

Pastured trumps fertility by a long shot.