photo #6817928

Thought this was worth sharing: I have laying hens. I get fresh eggs every day. I know the majority of people use store bought, but I want to give you a bit of advice on washing eggs and soaking them in warm water to bring to room temp. First and the most important for bakers. Never soak eggs in water. The shell is porous and it will absorb water into the egg. You don't want extra water in your recipe. If you've ever done this, I'm sure you noticed the egg was more watery. This can wreck your recipe. Just remember to bring your eggs to room temp naturally. Now, if you happen to get freshly laid yard eggs every day, the best thing to remember is that hens lay their eggs with a substance called the bloom on them. (Eggs bought from the grocery store have already had this bloom removed. This is the reason store eggs have a short expiration date.) The bloom is a film that protects the eggs from bacteria contamination. Just before the egg is laid, the bloom is deposited on the egg. Important to eggs when you have yard chickens because hens go through a setting period where they want to raise babies. Since they only lay at the most one egg a day, it's important that the egg is protected until she lays enough eggs to start sitting on them to hatch. She won't do the sitting until she's ready to hatch her babies. Nature planned this so all the eggs hatch at the same time. (A friend of mine just had a hen hatch out 15 babies.) This is why nature has the bloom to keep the egg from going bad until it is incubate. With unwashed fresh yard eggs, this bloom can extend the expiration date by weeks, even months. When I am ready to use the egg, I just wash it under running water to remove the bloom. To check eggs to make sure they are still good, put an egg in a bowl of tap water deep enough for the egg to submerge. If it stays on the bottom, it's still good. If it floats to the top, its bad. When an egg goes bad it releases a gas. This is what causes it to float. Now when you do this, make sure to not leave the egg in the water or it will start absorbing the water. And my last tip. If you are wanting to bake a white cake, use store bought eggs. Remember that with fresh yard eggs, the yolks are a deeper yellow (more like orange) because the chickens get to free range, get sunlight, and eat lots of bugs (protein). I haven't seen a grasshopper in our yard since we got our chickens lol. Hope I helped some of you. Happy baking all!!!