The eggshell colour depends on the breed of the hen. Generally speaking, white shell eggs come from hens with white feathers, while brown shell eggs are produced by hens with brown feathers.
But for the Australian brown eggs, verses the American white eggs, it just comes down to genetics! In Australia, commercial farms normally use Hy-Line Brown, ISA Brown and Hi-Sex Brown breeds. These breeds also have brown feathers. America mostly uses Leghorn chickens.
While it is true that eggs are cleaned before being packaged and sent to your grocery store, they are not bleached. In fact, most eggs start out white, but different breeds are genetically coded to release different colored pigments as the egg passes through the hen's oviduct. Voilà!
If you've never traveled outside of the US, chances are you didn't even know American eggs are different from eggs sold in other countries. According to the Huffington Post, this is due to a variety of factors such as how the chickens are raised and the rules surrounding how eggs are processed before they can be sold.
Those pigments, called xanthophylls, are also what give chicken skin and fat its yellowish tint. If the chicken happened to eat more white corn than yellow, the yolk will be paler as well. That's all there is to it.
Cleaning the eggs removes the cuticle, so the eggs must be kept at refrigeration temperature. Otherwise, the bacteria could easily enter the egg and multiply to dangerous levels. By keeping it out of the danger zone, salmonella can't multiply rapidly. Most other countries do not wash their eggs.
The move was mainly due to misconceptions back in the late 70s that white eggs were of lower quality and even that they were bleached which has now been rebuffed. Since the 1980s the British industry has produced almost 100 per cent brown shelled eggs for high street retailers.
The eggshell colour depends on the breed of the hen. Generally speaking, white shell eggs come from hens with white feathers, while brown shell eggs are produced by hens with brown feathers. Nutritionally, both brown and white eggs are identical unless the feed has been enhanced for speciality eggs such as Omega-3.
White eggs in the United States are not bleached, contrary to popular internet belief. The color, instead, depends on the kind of chicken that is laying the egg, and it usually corresponds with the color of the chicken's earlobe.
If you think a bright yellow or orange egg yolk is a sign of a healthy well-cared for chicken think again. Most eggs sold in Australia now have their yolks artificially brightened by manufactured additive food dyes placed into the chook's feed pellets.
The issues have been put down to a number of reasons, including rising feed costs, chicken disease outbreaks overseas, weather issues and the belief that supermarkets are phasing out caged eggs too soon.
The main egg colour available in Australia is brown, although a small number of farms also sell white eggs. While many people assume brown eggs are more natural and therefore healthier, that's not the case. Brown hens lay brown eggs, white hens lay white eggs, and they both have the same nutritional profile.
Why The U.S. Chills Its Eggs And Most Of The World Doesn't : The Salt In many countries, eggs aren't refrigerated and they're still considered safe to eat. But in the U.S., we have to chill them, because we've washed away the cuticle that protects them from bacteria.
Brown eggs are more expensive than white eggs because it costs more money to feed the chickens that produce the brown eggs. These hen breeds require more energy to lay their eggs and in turn, they will eat more and require larger amounts of food.
While diet and lifestyle can make slight differences to eggshell colour, the real deciding factor in colour is genetics. Certain breeds will lay eggs with darker shells, while others will lay eggs with lighter shells, and others will even lay eggs with a greenish-blue hue.
The color of the egg doesn't matter. What is important is the quality of the egg. You might notice that most chefs and bakers use brown eggs instead of white. This is most likely because brown eggs tend to be fresher than white as they come from local farms.
Differences in egg cleanliness standards. In the US eggs must be washed before being sold to ensure they are clean. In the UK they must not be washed, to ensure they are clean. Meaning that US eggs can't be sold in the UK, and vice versa.
This term is at least regulated by the USDA, which is helpful. Pasture-Raised Eggs / Pastured Eggs): Pasture-raised eggs (sometimes referred to as pastured eggs) are the healthiest eggs to buy, no question.
Egg washing is not required in Australia, but sale of dirty eggs is prohibited under Food Standards Australia New Zealand (FSANZ) requirements. A good option for cleaning dirty eggs is an automated washing machine system designed to produce a high recovery rate of first grade eggs.
But why is this? About 40 years ago, people decided that they didn't like the look of white eggs, so brown eggs were the ones sent to supermarkets for selling, and white eggs were reserved for restaurants and cafes aka where customers wouldn't seem them in their shells.
In Europe, farms vaccinate chickens against salmonella. That means the cuticle is still intact when eggs are sold. Refrigerating eggs with the cuticle intact could actually cause mildew to grow. Which could cause… you guessed it salmonella contamination.
In Europe and other parts of the world, another technique called ultra-heat-treated pasteurization, or UHT, is used. Milk is exposed to higher temperatures of 284°F for three seconds, decimating virtually all the bacteria and making it shelf-stable for about six months if left unopened.
Many European countries, like the UK, vaccinate their hens to prevent the transmission of salmonella when the hens lay eggs. The vaccinations, in conjunction with the protection of the “cuticle,” are thought to protect the European eggs from bacteria, therefore they don't refrigerate their eggs.