Alright, I felt stupid not knowing what Eggland’s Best was when I showed up to their blogger event. I didn’t really read the invite. All I knew was that it was across the street from my work at the Institute of Culinary Education. So what is Eggland’s Best? According to them, they’re the #1 branded egg in the U.S. And for this party, we were going to drink, cook and eat. I got the feeling from the bartender that he knew he was going to be my best friend that night.
They gave us aprons, cooking hats and put us to work. I volunteered to cut the duck prosciutto, because it sounds the most awesome. Eating the remnants from my fingers, it was pretty good. Almost like pork prosciutto, but maybe more like jerky. I moved onto poaching eggs. I fucked a lot of them up, but did make some nice ones.
I soon got bored and went back to drinking and watched everyone else work. I asked Roger, one of the managers at Eggland’s Best, if he got to take home all the eggs he wanted for free. I’m not sure what happened, but he soon went off on a whole spiel on eggs as if I blogged for PETA or made the movie, Food Inc. He told me the complexities of running an egg business, the effects of biofuel to the cost of corn (chicken feed), eggs being food that not only rich people should be able to afford (if we were to spend the money to free range every chicken), and why he won’t eat organic, cage-free eggs (which they do also sell). His reasoning: chickens on a free range kill each other and eat their own shit. That’s interesting for someone who can eat any egg he wants. All this might sound like a downer for a fun food blog event, but I really appreciated his honesty and I was genuinely interested.
We went on to eat some food. The CEO gave a Q&A and showed us the Hard Cooked Peeled Eggs in a Bag I posted earlier. I don’t know if it was just me, but I got the sense that some people there were as wasted as me. I believe the CEO gave one of the hard cooked eggs to the bloggers, then immediately took it back so he could squish it in his hand. Did that really happen?
It was an interesting event. I got some perspective from the business side of eggs and learned that with a few drinks, people seem to be a bit more human and in my case, relatable. When I left the building, I had no idea where I was even though I was right across the street from my work.
…I’m not really choosing sides here as far as animal ethics. I know it would suck to live in a cage, but at the same time the chicken probably thinks it sucks that I’m going eat its babies. As far as Eggland’s Best, they are a co-op owned by the farmers, they do sell organic & cage free eggs along with their regular caged ones, and are seemingly eco-conscious.
Eggland’s Best website – http://www.egglandsbest.com
