People are always trying to justify the inclusion of eggs in their diet.
Such promising claims include their protein, lutein, and vitamin and mineral content. However, each of these nutritional benefits can be easily obtained through plant-based sources.
Just like our fishy friends, eggs are another culinary option that often get mistaken for vegetables. I know that a standard vegetarian diet does
include eggs, but that still doesn’t mean that they are on the veggie side of the food pyramid. Think about what an actually egg is. It’s the reproductive cell of a chicken. Eggs are actually crazy high in cholesterol, they are acid-forming and suffer from many of the same disadvantages as meat. Much like how an unborn human baby is affected by everything its mother eats and experiences, the same goes for a chicken egg. So all the hormones, antibiotics and toxins that are consumed by the mother chook are absorbed into the egg.
What about “free range” or “cage free” eggs?
If you think you’re dodging this bullet by buying only ‘free-range’ or ‘cage-free’ eggs, think again. This means nothing! ‘Cage-free’ simply means the birds are not in cages. They are still exposed to all of the same horrific living conditions, they are fed the same unnatural diet and able to stay alive only by being given the same steady stream of antibiotics. ‘Free-range’ just means the birds have access to the outside. What they don’t tell you is the area they are only briefly allowed access to is no bigger than the size of an A4 piece of paper. As Jonathan Safran Foer writes in his brilliant book, Eating Animals, “I could keep a flock of hens under my sink and call them free-range.”
Are there any safe eggs?
In my opinion, the only way to be sure that the eggs you are eating aren’t contaminated is to source them from a farm you are personally familiar with. My boyfriend’s mum has chickens, so he eats the eggs he gets from her.
The moral of this story is that, just with all of the other food we eat, we need to be weary of where eggs are really coming from. Food regulations aren’t tight enough to prevent illegitimate claims being made on cartons of eggs.
And if you still buy cage eggs …
This is a video from the Animals Australia website of what the life of a battery hen really looks like. This is footage of how cage eggs are produced.
Positive affirmation for the day: I have the power to choose how I feel in this moment. I choose to let go of thoughts that are negative and destructive. All is well in my world.
