Stirring the Cauldron

New Moon Newsletters from Jessica Prentice

New Egg Moon

April moondark kitchen notes
from Jessica Prentice

Happy New Egg Moon! The moon is new today, and since new moons are a powerful time to make wishes, this might be a good time for all of us to make a wish for peace -- especially in Iraq, and a prayer for the safety of civilians in Baghdad. Eggs, like seeds (another name for this lunar cycle in Colonial America was the Seed Moon), are symbolic of hope, and of a future that is fertile with life.

On old-fashioned farms, this was the time of year when the hens started laying more eggs. Production of eggs in winter is slow -- in some cases extremely slow -- and in the spring the laying picks up considerably. Chickens respond to longer days by increased laying -- it's part of their natural cycle. You'd hardly know this shopping in the grocery store, where eggs are plentiful year-round. But factory-farming of eggs maximizes production all year, often by artificially lighting the egg factory, sometimes 24-hours a day, and of course using antibiotics to artificially stimulate production.

I know when egg season is here by checking out the eggs at a vendor at my local farmers market. In early spring he begins to bring goose eggs -- enormous white eggs with a thick shell and a large yolk. I love these rich eggs, these powerful harbingers of spring. One goose egg, scrambled, will feed two people. The taste is very similar to chicken eggs, but a bit richer (and the color is yellower) since the proportion of yolk to white is higher -- just the way I like it. Evidently, the geese don't lay much at all in wintertime, or even in summer or fall for that matter, so goose eggs are very seasonal around here. This egg farmer will also bring lots of araucana eggs at this time of year -- pale blue eggs from a small breed of chicken. They are beautiful eggs, and special because these chickens are not heavy producers. The farmer charges more for the araucana eggs, and each goose egg is $2.50, but I have no trouble paying for the pleasure of a goose egg in spring.

Farming truly free-range eggs from out-doors chickens is much more expensive and labor-intensive than the factory-farmed eggs in the supermarket. I spoke to an egg rancher who said that to truly recoup the costs of producing his eggs (a small-scale, very humane, free-range system), he would need to charge $6.00/dozen. He refused to do it saying that if he did, he'd "have to admit [he] was an elitist.'" But I for one would be willing to pay it. Even at 50¢ apiece, eggs are affordable and -- if properly farmed -- extremely nutritious. A two-egg breakfast would still cost only a dollar, and I would know that I was eating an egg that contained all the life-giving nutrient-density it was meant to have.

Like so many Americans, I was at one point hoodwinked into believing that eggs were bad for me. I bought the line that eating cholesterol would clog my arteries; succumbed to the macrobiotic belief that eggs were so 'yang' that they would throw my system off-balance; and fretted over the 'alternative-health' notion that eating eggs would somehow disrupt my reproductive system. Luckily, though, these notions didn't hold me in thrall for long, and the more I studied about eggs and nutrition, the more I understood that the real problem with eggs is not the eggs themselves, but the production model used by factory farms.

This makes a good egg hard to find. The vast majority of eggs in this country are produced by large corporations that may subcontract production out to farmers who used to be independent, but now live in a system that one rancher likened to indentured servitude. Male chicks are immediately killed, sometimes ground up into pet food. Female chicks may have a worse fate: beaks burned or sliced off to keep them from pecking each other to death; fed a standardized, horrible, commercial feed laced with antibiotics (and most likely, GMO's); housed in crowded buildings with no access to sunlight or the outdoors; force-molted by food-deprivation to increase egg production; and then killed when production begins to fall-off even slightly. These hens are so over-bred, so confined, and so sedentary during their short miserable lives that they don't have use of their legs or wings. The eggs are sold by these corporation for rock-bottom prices that don't begin to reflect the true costs of production. In some cases, yolks are dyed to make them yellow -- a color that is natural when the chicken spends time in the sunlight.

It is a terrible thing to do a living being, and a disgraceful defilement of this symbol of life, hope, and fertility -- the egg.

Unfortunately, many of the eggs sold in natural groceries as 'free-range' are only a little better (if any) than this scenario. There is currently no regulation whatsoever of the term 'free-range' when it comes to eggs. The national organic standards do require that organic eggs come from chickens that have some access to the outdoors, but there is no minimum requirement for how much access. The recent fast-tracking of a stipulation that meat can be sold as organic even if the animal was fed non-organic feed shows the vulnerability of these kinds of standards to corruption by agribusiness corporations.

Consumers are concerned about egg-laying hens, and will pay more for 'organic' or 'free-range' eggs, and large-scale commercial operations are more than happy to exploit this concern and do whatever they can to jump on the band-wagon and be able to call their only marginally-better chickens and eggs 'free-range' or 'organic.'

So, what's an egg-lover like me to do? Give up eggs? Not a chance.

Eggs are one of my favorite foods in their own right, and are indispensable for cooking and baking so many other things. Besides, good eggs from a good source are nutritional marvels. So I buy eggs at a farmers market, directly from a rancher whose laying hens live in humane conditions: outdoors, eating bugs, beaks intact, pecking in the dirt -- the same farmer who brings the wonderful goose eggs this time of year.

And I am hoping to soon begin buying eggs from another local rancher, one who practices a pasture-based poultry system which involves chickens being moved onto pastureland after cattle have been there eating the grass. The henhouse is mobile, and is brought out to the pasture. The door is opened and the chickens move out onto the land.

They eat grass, and peck through the cowpies left by the cattle, breaking them up and eating the bugs, helping to recycle nutrients back into the soil and creating rich, nutritious eggs. This diet is supplemented with a high-quality mix of organic grains, oyster shell, kelp and minerals. The henhouse offers necessary shelter, as well as bedded egg boxes, an elevated floor, and a roost. This rancher charges $4.50/dozen for the eggs, and it is a price I will be happy to pay.

Eggs from pastured chickens have more Vitamin E, B12, carotenes, antioxidants, and Omega 3 fatty acids than battery (factory farmed) eggs. As the saying goes, what's good for the goose is good for the gander -- and what's good for the chicken is good for the egg (and the egg-eater). This is also what's good for the earth. The more you learn about food, the more you find this to be true: healthy farming systems support healthy ecosystems, healthy food systems, healthy economic systems, and healthy human communities. We just need to learn to put our money where our mouth is and support responsible farmers with our food dollars (and invest the time and energy to find good sources for the foods we eat).

For more information about what questions to ask an egg farmer about conditions for the hens, go to Real Eggs from a Real Farm (on WestonAPrice.org) and scroll down towards the end. To learn more about pasture-based complementary cattle-and-poultry ranching (as well as nationwide sources for pasture-fed eggs and other foods) check out EatWild.com.

Celebrate and honor the New Egg Moon by seeking out eggs from a local, small-scale, humane, family farm -- and eating them. A recipe follows.

Wishing you all a hope-full Egg Moon. Light a candle for peace, and another for the chickens.

Asparagus Frittata

Asparagus season is in full-tilt around here.

• One bunch asparagus
• 1 large or two small leeks
• 4-6 eggs from family farm chickens, or 1-2 goose eggs
• 1/4 cup cream, half-and-half, or whole milk (from a family dairy, of course)
• 1/4 cup grated cheese such as cheddar or monterey jack, or crumbled feta (cheese is optional)
• 2 tablespoons butter
• salt and pepper
• nutmeg

Break off tough ends of asparagus. Cut asparagus into 2-inch lengths (on the bias) and steam or blanch in boiling water until barely tender -- just a couple of minutes. Remove from heat and allow to cool quickly (or plunge in ice-water).

Slice leeks in thick rounds and put in a bowl of cold water and mix to get the dirt out.

Melt butter in an oven-safe skillet (cast iron or stainless steel), and when it's hot lift the leeks out of the water in handfuls and put in the pan. Saute over medium heat until just soft.

Meanwhile, mix together the egg(s) with cream, milk, or combination.

Add a generous amount of salt and pepper, and a grating of nutmeg.

(Because I buy farm fresh eggs, I always taste my raw egg mixture and don't worry about salmonella -- this way I can taste whether it's salty enough. For my palate, the egg mixture should be salty enough to taste the salt, yet not overly salty...)

Add the asparagus to the pan and pour the egg mixture over, then add in the cheese, pressing it gently into the eggs. Let cook on stovetop over low heat a few minutes, and then transfer to a low oven (about 300 - 325 degrees) until the eggs are just set. (You can also finish under a broiler, as long as the pan isn't too deep and you keep a close eye to make sure it doesn't burn).

Remove from oven and slice and eat, served with salad and good bread, and maybe new potatoes.

If asparagus isn't in season yet where you are, you can make this recipe using winter greens such as kale or chard. Just cut greens into ribbons, and instead of blanching, add them (washed) to the sauteed leeks and saute until tender. Then proceed with eggs. Especially good with feta!