4m x 3m Omlet pen, cube, new auto door still boxed and coop light

[cherryblossom]

Hi all,

 

am I the only person who thinks their chickens eggs taste just like shop bought battery hen eggs?

We have only had our chickens for a week, and so far have had 6 eggs, eaten 3. To me they taste just like bought ones. Everyone always seems to say how much better they are, but even freerange bought eggs always taste the same to me.

 

I have no idea how the chickens were kept before we got them, do you think the taste will improve now that they are free ranging a fair bit each day?

[..lay a little egg for me]

I'm sure you will notice a difference once they have been free-ranging for a while. I think our chooks eggs taste best of all when scrambled with some butter and eaten on buttered toast.

[the eggman cometh]

I think a lot of it depends on what they have to eat. We tend to keep our in the run for the morning, so they eat their pellets, and then let them out in the afternoon so they can scratch around in the mud and pebbles in the garden. As we have no grass we also give them a variety of greens, the prefer Spinach but also get Kale "greens" savoy cabbage and broccoli. As well as the odd handful of corn.

 

Its also fun to watch them play "apple football"

[cherryblossom]

Ours are in their run most of the time, but spend about 5-7 hours free ranging the garden a day.

They have been eating the pellets, grass, lots of ants, beetles, grubs, yum yum. And a little bit of grain mix. They have also tried to eat my freckles and my wedding ring lol.

[Hen Watch]

When my Omlet hens were young and first laying their yolks were small and pale yellow and just like shop bought eggs.

 

But after a few months of free ranging and greens etc, the yolks soon got much much larger and moved to a darker yellow and now they are almost an orange colour. They taste fabulous and when I recently ran out of eggs and bought free range ones from a shop my son hated his scrambled egg as it looked anemic and pale yellow (instead of bright yellow) and had no taste.......

 

So you just need to give it time I think for free ranging and extra greens to work through their system.....

[chickencam]

The taste improves as the hens mature.

 

I remember thinking the same thing.

 

My son has a poached egg for breakfast every day and my YD has a boiled egg. I had to buy some eggs before Christmas when we had only one hen laying. the children didn't like the pale eggs at all plus they were no good for poaching because they were too old.

 

It is worth feeding the best quality layers pellets that you can afford, because they will probaly eat the cheap stuff on a lot of commercial farms.

 

The flavour also varies from hen to hen, one of out Pepperpots lays the most delicious eggs.