@gertrudecloset wrote:
@JeanLouiseFinch wrote:
DH and I eat at least one egg each everyday, sometimes more depending on my meal plans. Most of the time they're hard cooked, but we also like fried, scrambled, and omelettes. I usually make a week's worth of hard cooked at a time, I always try to buy pasture raised eggs because eggs labeled as such have specific requirements to meet. Labels like cage free or free range sound good, but are really gimmicky terms that don't really guarantee anything as to the care of the hens or quality of the eggs. I'm used to paying about $4.69/dozen for pasture raised at Aldi. They have recently jumped to $5.29. The everyday basic eggs have jumped to right around $4.69 or $4.89, I think. I'll be at Aldi again today so we'll see if they've jumped again.
ETA - pastured raised were $4.99/dozen today.
@JeanLouiseFinch
There is nothing "gimmicky" about the terms used to describe the way eggs are manufactured. They all mean something different. Besides, you have to go by what the manufacturer says anyway, like for anything else we buy ~ we hope they are being truthful.
“Cage-free,” “pasture-raised,” and “free-range” describe different methods of egg production.
Essentially, these terms refer to the differing levels of animal welfare standards that farmers use on their farms.
There are no solid definitions of what constitutes cage, cage-free, free-range, or pasture-raised eggs. Often, certification programs offer the best indication of how farmers keep their hens, but there are several certification programs that they can apply to.
Read on to learn more about the various egg production methods and the certifications that define them, as well as the benefits of and differences between each type.
To read this information in it's entirety you can find the entire document at Medicalnewstoday dot com.
From an article on eater dot com. It gives a good overview of varying conditions under which hens lay eggs.
What’s the Difference between….
Cage-free, Pasture-raised, Free-range, and Organic Eggs?
Unless you have a chicken coop in your backyard, or the access to and budget for farm-fresh eggs every day, you’re probably spending some time in the supermarket egg aisle. And if you’re spending time in the supermarket egg aisle, you’re probably familiar with the assault of qualifiers and descriptors — Cage-free! Hormone-Free! Free-range! Local! — that awaits you there. Here’s what they all mean, and how to navigate them efficiently — so you can get to the rest of your grocery list.
Cage-free, a term regulated by the USDA, means that the eggs come from hens that, put simply, aren’t caged: They can “freely roam a building, room, or enclosed area with unlimited access to food and fresh water during their production cycle, but [do] not have access to the outdoors.” Considering the conventional cage is 8 ½ by 11 inches, or the size of a piece of paper, this seems like a better lifestyle — but there are downsides, too. According to All About Eggs by Rachel Khong, cage-free facilities have more hen-on-hen violence and lower air quality than facilities that use cages.
Free-range, another USDA term, means that the eggs come from hens that have some sort of access to the outdoors. However, it doesn’t mean that the hens actually go outdoors, or that the outdoor space is more than a small, fenced-in area; it simply implies that a door exists that a farmer could at some point open.
Pasture-raised is not a term regulated by the USDA; however, if the carton says “pasture-raised” and also includes stamps that say “Certified Humane” and/or “Animal Welfare Approved,” it means that each hen was given 108 square feet of outdoor space, as well as barn space indoors. This is pretty much as close to the bucolic, E-I-E-O farm vibe you’ll get when dealing with large-scale egg producers, so if you’re looking to support those practices, keep a look out for those labels.
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