Let Them Roam, For the Love of Eggs

My next door neighbors, who are 6- and 7-year-old sisters, brought home four baby chicks for Easter. These chicks have been the cause of much excitement next door. So much excitement that I think a replacement chick may have had to be ordered, a casualty of such high spirits. But that’s another story. 

The neighbor kids started their chicks in a little box with a heat lamp and in the last few weeks the chicks are now let to roam free in the back yard for a few hours a day. I’ve gone over to see them scraping and pecking at the moss and bugs in the back yard. 

Hopefully the neighbors have thought about the fact that these chicks will soon be full grown chickens. Hopfully more than my parents did when they gave me two ducklings that lived in the dining room for a month. We ended up giving ours to a farm. But the neighbors already have a hearty coop built and plan to keep their chicks for the eggs. The experience has been good so far.

Raising backyard chickens is all the rage these days. There's even a family that sells chicks in Mill Valley - Mill Valley Chickens should you be interested in buying your own. They are $15 each and there are classes offered on how to raise them. Another .

The fact is, people want a fresh egg. And a backyard egg is just a micro form of a pasture raised egg, which is also all the rage these days. Farms like Fallon Hills Ranch, known for raising beef and lambs, are raising chickens too. You can find Fallon Hills Ranch pasture raised eggs at the , and just as many other Marin ranches are finding, chickens are proving to be a lucrative business. 

In the confounding world of free-range, cage-free, cruelty-free and pasture raised chickens, it turns out that your backyard chickens and your pasture raised chickens are the way to go. They are better for you, having significantly higher levels of Omega 3's. They are remarkably more flavorful, the texture, color and flavor changing depending on what that chicken is eating. And free chickens are happy chickens. Well, at least they're not stressed chickens.  

I have no doubt that there are exceptions, but most "free-range" chickens simply live in mass holding pens that require that they have a door to go outside. Chickens that are used to being confined rarely venture out. Cage-free also usually just means a bigger cage that is still packed with chickens and possibly with their beaks cut off to avoid pecking injuries. Horrible, I know. You can imagine that these chickens are fed the same staple of meal, not the variety of nutrients and protein a happy free chicken would gobble up out on the range. 

Pastured chickens usually roam free during the day in the pasture or can be housed in portable pens with wheels that are rolled from patch to patch of pasture for optimum pecking. They cleaning up the ground after the cows have gone through, both benefiting the land and grasses. Pasture raised chickens feast on everything from bugs, seeds, tender shoots of grasses and grubs which create rich orange yolks and flavors that change based on the land and the time of year. Chickens, like everything else, have a season. 

"Egg production correlates directly with sunlight," says Kevin Maloney of Fallon Hills Ranch. "Chickens will naturally take off the winter. It's called a 'molt,' a rest period. They stop eating, lose weight." 

I thought most animals, like humans, fatten up for the winter. 

"Chickens have never been accused of being the smartest animals," says Maloney. He says that because chickens are so photo reactive, egg production has slowed because of the wet dark spring. 

Even so, there are eggs to be found, and yes, they cost a pretty penny. Pasture raised eggs usually running around 7-8 dollars. I remember the first time I bought a carton of $8 eggs in my effort to eat locally, humanely, sustainably (enter 'catch phrase' here).

“That’ll be eight dollars,” said the boy behind the register. “Pardon me?” I said. “Eight dollars,” he said without a hint of shame. Before I could retreat, or balk or risk looking like I had choked on my eight dollars in front of the other customers who’s food priorities were obviously already very much in line - I forked over my cash.  

I've decided that the best way to eat $8 eggs is as plain as possible so you really savor the taste. I prefer poached eggs especially when the whites are that bright white almost fluffy texture. And I'll be the first to admit, I am horrible at it. I have never been able to master the art of poaching an egg. I've made the mistake of cracking them right into boiling water only to have the egg-white shred to pieces leaving a lonely yolk intact. I had never even heard about the vinegar trick. Here is a great link to poaching the perfect egg. I'm getting better. 

Poached Egg on Toast with Savory Greens

• 2 pasture raised eggs
• 2 pieces fresh bread - I used a fresh kalamata olive loaf
• 2 tsp butter
• 4 cups baby lettuce, mesclun, frisee, blossoms (any combination) - I found a speckled heirloom lettuce variety from Bloomfield Farms, I think they called it 'Fat Man.' 
• 1 tbs fresh fennel herb (optional) 

Lemon Vinaigrette

• 1 tbs shopped shallots
• 1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
• 1/2 cup olive oil
• dash salt 
• 1 tsp sugar

First make your vinaigrette. Add shallots, lemon juice and salt in small bowl. Whisk in olive oil and sugar. Toss your greens and fennel so they are coated lightly in dressing. Add to plate. 

Poach eggs. Toast and butter your bread. And save some toast for mopping up those golden (literally) yolks . 

Serves 2