White eggs!

The eggs in our Sainsbury’s online order this week were white shells,haven’t had white shells since I was a child,but they were delicious deep yellow yolks would certainly buy again.

As they say"eggs is eggs". I remember, as a child, collecting eggs from grannies chickens, brown , white, beige colour. All with lovely yellow yolks.

Elegran

Kate1949

The shells of white eggs we have had lately seem more brittle than the brown ones.

Probably from a breed suited to intensive production - start laying younger, perhaps, or lay more eggs per season.

Just need more grit in their diet (or so I was told when I was a child).

Visgir1

My Mum had bought some White Eggs from a Farm shop. My son was about 6 years at the time. He was getting something out of her fridge. He saw the white Eggs, with a serious face he went to my mum saying "I don't want to worry you Nanny, but all your Eggs have gone White"

Oh this is too cute! 💙

I buy Burford Browns.
They’re never white. 🤣

Anyone still get ‘double yolkers’? I’ve not seen one for years.

Not for long while.

Brown eggs was purely a fashion choice. When I was a child white eggs were the usual shop eggs and if they had brown ones they were more expensive. We were told that they cost more because the brown hens that laid them were bigger and ate more. Naturally because the brown eggs were more expensive they became more desirable and everyone started wanting them. I can't remember the name of the commercial hybrid that was used when I started keeping hens, but it was bred from the Rhode Island Red. My friend who still keeps hens has a nice variety. Mostly brown eggs, but a couple that lay white eggs and one that lays blue. The colour of the yolk depends on what you feed them, like the pink in flamingo's feathers. Americans are apparently quite happy with white eggs.

I used to breed and sell rare breed hens and cartons of mixed coloured eggs to the village shop and pub. (eggs not chickens 😂)

The egg colours were:

Cream Legbar - blue/green
Marans - dark brown
Welsummer - dark brown but lighter than Marans.
Barnevelder - as above
Leghorn - white.

I had to give up when DH became ill and in any case I’ve moved now but I do have fond memories of my chooks.

but I do have fond memories of my chooks.

chooks - love that name for them. They're always called chooks in Australia 🙂🐓

It’s curious that the British prefer brown-shelled eggs. In France, it’s the opposite, if I remember rightly. Something to do with brown bread being better for you?

Although I agree there’s no difference in the taste, one thing I don’t like about white eggs is how it’s easy very to miss little bits of shell when peeling a boiled egg.

Maybe it’s just me though, a “should have gone to Specsavers” moment!

When I was little it was always white eggs if my mum bought them occasionally. My dad had chickens their eggs were white I don’t exactly know when but brown eggs suddenly appeared everywhere.
I have bought white eggs often it reminds me of childhood and I don’t know what difference it makes. There are blue eggs on sale and they don’t taste any different either. As long as they are free range I don’t have a problem what colour they are.

I thought that shell colour depended on the breed of hen? That white feathered hens give white eggs and brown feathered hens brown eggs.

Although there was a lot of nonsense about 40 or 50 years ago about brown eggs being better for you - brown bread as well - not wholemeal bread but the white bread dyed brown.

I have a box of eggs from a local organic farmer and they are all white this time.

All eggs were white when we lived in America except the ones bought directly from a farm we visited.

I was told, as others have said, it was a breed thing, not diet.

I have just read that Halal eggs apparently have to be white.
I wonder, if true, if that is why there are more white again?

All commercial hens are hybrids the old “breeds” like Rhode Island Red or White Leghorn eat a lot more and don’t lay as many eggs.
Burford Browns are large outdoor hens and eat a lot that’s why the eggs are probably the most expensive in the shelf and may be double the cost of white eggs at the same store

NotSpaghetti

I have just read that Halal eggs apparently have to be white.
I wonder, if true, if that is why there are more white again?

Where did you read that?

How can a chicken egg, whether it's brown, white, blue or green, be anything other than halal?

Halal eggs come from animals which it's halal to eat.

So, no, those pesky Muslims can't be blamed for white eggs.

David49

White eggs are laid by mostly a strain of hens that are white and lighter weight than brown hens, because they are smaller they eat less. Most retail customers prefer brown eggs, most white eggs are sold to commercial users although even Waitrose stocks white eggs as the lowest cost line

A correct post here.
White hens live longer and are more productive. They are also less aggressive and fight less, so fewer of them get pecked to death by their feathered friends.
White eggs are cheaper.
I used to do a lot of decorative egg painting. I learnt from a German friend and she said Germany mainly buys eggs from Holland, and that for many reasons they have to be white.

We used to draw a face on the egg shell whatever the colour

You can make a brown eggshell white by soaking it in vinegar. It also becomes harder and easier to paint.

lemsip

I just cannot buy 'White' eggs. sainsbury and m&s were full of them recently.
I know they are just the same inside but look horrible

Same here! I just don’t like the look of white eggs. The shells always look rather fragile and thin too.

Many, many moons ago when I was young and living with my parents, my DM kept hens and sold the eggs to the egg packing station who collected them weekly, scanned them for blood spots, etc, and stamped the little lion on them. We had about 300. Two sorts raised from chicks which she bought as day olds to be raised in an incubator at the end of the hall (we never used the front door anyway). They were a commercial breed - Thornbers 404 (not sure of the spelling) which were brown, chunkier birds and laid brown eggs and Thornbers 505 which were white, smaller, flightier and laid white eggs. Kept in runs and fed the same. Apart from the egg shell colour the egg inside was exactly the same. There is no difference. Back then no one particularly cared about egg shell colour, more about the hens and how they were fed. Then the media decided that brown eggs were better and we stopped keeping white hens as no one wanted the eggs.

I love passing our local egg place and seeing all the hens out in their pasture. They have different fields, so one is always full of the 'normal' chickens and the other has their newer pullets. It's a very popular place - they regularly sell out of eggs. I think people love being able to see that they are truly 'free range' - and the eggs are no more expensive than supermarket free range ones, possibly even cheaper in some cases.

growstuff - how rude!

I have no idea where I once came upon it - but it was ages ago.
I had forgotten all about it - it's certainly an odd idea. It' not something I've ever thought of any significance.