Are white eggs better than brown eggs?

The classic question – are white eggs better than brown eggs? Which is healthier? They definitely taste different! Why are white eggs so popular? What happens if I have a blue or even green egg? Does it come with a slice of ham?!

Nutrition: White eggs and brown eggs are the same.

No buzz or shocking sharable news here – the shell color doesn’t change the nutrition of the egg. The color of the egg comes from the chicken’s genes. There’s no proven studies yet that blue or green eggs have a different nutrition either. Changing the environment of the hen and her feed can change the contents of the egg!

A more nutritious egg

The amount of Vitamin D in an egg yolk is influenced by how much sunlight (like time outside) a hen is exposed to. This doesn’t mean access to “free-range” but a hen actually wanting to and taking advantage of being outdoors.

Hens on pasture with access to forage and bugs had eggs with 38% more vitamin A, twice as much vitamin E, more than 2x the omega-3 fatty acids, and less than half the omega-6 to omega 3 ratio than commercially produced eggs. A hen can’t get all the protein and energy requirements from pastures only – her body size and egg production will decrease on a pasture only diet. (Our hens are offered a balanced ration free choice and roam around as much as they want once we’re up in the morning and let them out of the coop.)

Do white eggs have better flavor than brown eggs?

Truthfully, in several blind taste trials humans just can’t seem to tell the difference. So what’s going on here? Preference seems phycological – we think the eggs we grew up with taste the best, or feel the perceptions of free range or yolk color. Even with pasture eggs having nutritional benefits, this just doesn’t seem obvious to taste buds.

If a hen was fed fish products to boost omega-3, that flavor could pass through the egg, but this has nothing to do with the shell color.

Still convinced our eggs just taste DIFFERENT?

People can sense the freshness of the egg and find that fresher eggs taste better. Knowing your local bird gets you pretty fresh! (Look at our carton for the days the eggs were laid.) A fresh egg’s yolk stands up tall. If you ever wanted to experiment with fancy ways to cook eggs, now is the time! At 5 days old the air cell becomes larger and the egg contracts, meaning this egg will be easier to peel when boiled. As the egg ages the whites become thinner, losing their thickening and leavening power, and the yolk is flatter and more easily broken.

With hens raised the same way, it’s impossible to tell white eggs from brown when you fry up the eggs in the pan. The inside is the same. A FRESH egg though will taste better than an old, weak one.

Bright fresh yolks from our hens, vs older, dull yolks from the grocery store

It’s tough to figure out how old a grocery store egg might be. Egg cartons from the grocery store do come with a date code or ‘sell by’, but the laws don’t make it clear the age – the code may reference when the egg was put into the carton. An egg can be sold for up to 30 days after the date on the carton, and in some cases the farm has up to 30 days from when the egg is laid to get it into the carton. According to Fresh Eggs Daily a supermarket egg could be two months old by the time you buy.

*There are tons of claims about the age of eggs in grocery stores, and it’s not clear from our prelim research what’s the truth. Find the Fresh Eggs Daily reference here.*