TAHLEQUAH, Okla. – May is National Egg Month, putting a spotlight on orbs that are high in protein, taste delicious, and are a good food for summer picnics, lunches or quick snack for kids or work breaks.
Angelica Avila is an avid gardener and now has branched out to raising chickens. She walked among her flock in the back yard of 13 free-range hens of various breeds, three roosters she is rehoming at the farm swap in Muskogee, and a pen of Silkies with fluffy plumage.
Her daughter loves boiled eggs, and Avila keeps plenty on hand for a ready snack when needed. She gets about a dozen eggs a day, and spreads the wealth to her neighbors. She also cooks them up and feeds them back to the hens. The shells are crushed and also fed to the layers, the extra calcium helping to form stronger shells.
She has some babies in a brooder that will produce a wider range of egg colors to complement the greens, blues, shades of brown and white ones she already collects.
“One will lay a chocolate brown color, and the chickens I have extra I’m planning to take to the farm swap,” Avila said. “They have a farm swap in Muskogee that meets the second and fourth Saturday of the month, and recently the 4-H Club set up a smaller one on the first and third Saturday – past the car wash going toward the Woodall School.”
The smaller eggs are laid by the Silkies, the green ones are from Sapphire Gem hens, and Americanas lay blue eggs, Avila said.
“The Polish hen is the manager of the flock, and follows me around when I’m doing the feeding and collecting eggs. If she doesn’t like what I’m doing, she will peck at my feet,” Avila said.
The roosters are going to be gone soon and are contained because she doesn’t want fertilized eggs right now, and doesn’t want their crowing to annoy her neighbors. Avila’s mother raised chickens for years and inspired her to get into chickens last year.
“She helped me build the hoop coop, and a coop for the Silkies,” Avila said. “I keep the Silkie Bantams penned up because they aren’t the smartest, even for a chicken, and the poofy plumage on their head obstructs their vision so they might not see a predator.”
She doesn’t have much of an issue with hawks or owls, but in the beginning, raccoons were an issue. The hoop coop with a run has an automatic door that opens in the early morning, letting the hens out into the run to eat and drink before she lets them out later in the morning. Before she had the run installed, the raccoons would wait for the door to open and then pick them off.
“I lost quite a few when I first started – the ones that weren’t quite grown and smaller – and I also had a smaller breed and they got all of those,” Avila said. “It’s relaxing to come out back and watch the antics as they scratch around in the dirt.”
A suggestion of adding wasabi to egg salad sounded good to Avila and told her mother about the idea. They both are going to try it, as Avila loves wasabi, and adding the pungent, green root in the mustard family foregoes the need to add salt. Wasabi is native to Japan, South Korea, and Russia, and is served as a paste with sushi and sashimi.
Scrambled eggs may sound easy enough, but on the website loveandlemons.com, a recipe for this common dish assures a fluffy result.
First, beat the eggs by placing them in a medium bowl and whisking until the yolk and whites are thoroughly combined. Add milk or water, and whisk again until the mixture has an even yellow color with no translucent spots or streaks. Preheat the pan on medium heat, brush the skillet with olive oil or melt a little butter. Pour the mixture into the pan and let it cook undisturbed for a few seconds. Pull a rubber spatula along the bottom of the pan to form large, soft curds of scrambled eggs. Continue cooking over medium-low heat, folding and stirring the eggs every few seconds. As the eggs cook, make sure to scrape the spatula along the bottom and sides of the pan to continue to form curds and to prevent any part of the eggs from drying out.
“For a soft, creamy scramble, stop cooking when the eggs are mostly set, but a little liquid egg remains,” states the recipe site. “Remove the pan from the heat, and season to taste with salt and pepper.”
An article titled, “9 Benefits of Eggs,” published on the website healthline.com, states eggs are not only a good source of protein, but also fat and important vitamins, and relatively low in calories.
“Eggs are among the most nutritious foods on the planet,” states the article. “A whole egg contains all the nutrients required to turn a single cell into a baby chicken.”
One boiled egg contains 8% of the daily value needed of vitamin A, 6% of folate, 14% of vitamin B5, 23% of vitamin B12, 20% of riboflavin – B2, 7% of phosphorus, and 28% of selenium, states the article.
“Eggs also contain decent amounts of vitamin D, vitamin E, vitamin B6, calcium and zinc,” states the article. “This comes with 78 calories, 6 grams of protein, and 5 grams of fat.”
Eggs also contain various trace nutrients important to a person’s health, and the site claims eggs are close to the perfect food and contain a little bit of almost every nutrient needed.
“If you can get your hands on pastured or omega-3-enriched eggs, these are even more nutrient-dense,” states the article. “They contain higher amounts of omega-3 fat and are much higher in vitamins A and E.”