Farm-Fresh Eggs

No longer will "farm-fresh" be just the preferred phrase of commercial producers to entice shoppers to buy their eggs. As of last week, "farm-fresh" became a reality on our farm.

While the grocery store aisles abound in marketing what Michael Pollan calls "supermarket pastoral," we have the real deal. While they are rather successfully convincing the public that they're out mucking around in the coop just like we are every day and caring for the chickens as if they're pets, we really are.

On the cartons, they make claims like "100-percent vegetarian," which makes me laugh because now that I'm raising chickens myself, I positively know that these birds do not by nature eat soybeans and corn. I suppose it's a step up from feeding chickens chickens, but the industry is feeding us marketing with their pictures of fake farms and health claims on the label. My chickens eat bugs and grass. They love it. Somehow those two chicken delicacies turn into yummy, nutritious eggs with golden centers darker than any store-bought variety.

After five long months of anticipation, a few of our pullets have started laying. It is such a delight to look inside the nesting boxes and find a golden egg sitting there! Currently, there are only one or two eggs each day, but the ladies are still young and as they mature their production will become more consistent and their egg size will increase.

Our first product testing was one of my favorite meals: breakfast for dinner. Mike started with butter and rosemary in the pan then wiped it up with sourdough bread and toasted it. We added the bacon made earlier that morning just to warm it.

Then we cracked open these beauties.

We cut some slices of avocado and had one fantastic dinner -- especially knowing that we were eating was truly farm fresh.