White Eggs vs. Brown Eggs

White Eggs vs. Brown Eggs – With the Easter season upon us you may be wondering…..
Is there any difference between white eggs and brown eggs? You have probably wondered why your market carries only one, or perhaps both, kinds of eggs. Why? There must be something going on here, right?  The answer may surprise you – there is  no difference whatsoever in the use, contents or flavor of an egg whether its shell is white or brown. Indeed, chicken eggs come in a variety of colors, not just brown or white.

But there is a difference: the white ones are white; the brown ones are…well, brown.

Truly, their color comes down to what breed of chicken is laying your egg. If the egg in question is given by an Amber Link or Isa Red, chances are good it’s from a hatchery, lays the brown eggs you can buy at your grocery store and are slightly larger than their white egg counterparts, on the whole. These breeds are larger than white-egg layers, and therefore their eggs are a bit larger. White Leghorns, on the other hand, are prolific layers and are the breed most commercial hatcheries raise to produce the white eggs you buy.

There are differences in the way some eggs taste. But this is more because of what the chickens are fed. Backyard chickens may be left to roam free eating grasses, weeds and the occasional (but forbidden) pea pod of peony, supplemented by feed and kitchen scraps. Their eggs may have a slightly different taste than hatchery eggs whose mothers ate a regular, regimented diet.

Other variations in egg color are related to the chicken’s age: older chickens tend to lay lighter-colored eggs.

Blue and speckled eggs are available too, but more widely available to friends of backyard chicken folks or in the occasional bin at your gourmet food “shoppe.”

As for me, when I buy brown eggs over white ones, it’s because of price (price is always important, right?). But there is one egg I would prefer above all others. My great-grandmother raised turkeys. Many a rural cook will tell you: there’s nothing like cooking with turkey eggs. So, if my grandmother was growing turkey eggs you can bet that those are ones I’d choose, if she could spare a couple, brown or white.