How old was the oldest egg you've ever cooked?

[Spartan22]

Nice ladies! Very informative, I thought eggs are viable for 3-4 weeks unrefrigerated and unwashed. Since that is the window of sitting and hatching in nature. Refrigerated and washed it will last couple of months to eat. The 45 days thing is the government regulating the sale commercially since there's that window of 60 days freshness(govt standard) give or take.

 

[starlingdaly]

That is the standard set by the USDA. You can view it on their website. If you choose to get your Candling /grading license this is the protocol you have to follow.

I will never have enough chickens to sell so many eggs that I need to grade my eggs, but thanks for the tip.

 

[dmbnj]

I've eaten supermarket eggs kept under constant refrigeration, 40 days past the sell by date, and they were fine. I wouldn't eat them raw, but well cooked and had no issues. It's good to know that the USDA policy is 45 days for refrigerated eggs. I've gotten to the point that I needed to start selling eggs, and that gives me a guideline.

 

[starlingdaly]

I've eaten supermarket eggs kept under constant refrigeration, 40 days past the sell by date, and they were fine.  I wouldn't eat them raw, but well cooked and had no issues.  It's good to know that the USDA policy is 45 days for refrigerated eggs.  I've gotten to the point that I needed to start selling eggs, and that gives me a guideline.

I agree with you on old eggs needing to be cooked! I would only eat them raw if they were extremely fresh and clean from the nest.
I'm running an experiment in my fridge with eggs from June that I coated in palm shortening and refrigerated the day they were laid. In January I will crack them open and see how they did.

 

[goldfishes]

I remember eating several month old eggs growing up. We didn't waste much. My grandma taught me how to test them: place the egg in a small bowl of water. If it completely floats, it's usually too old to eat. They start to rot fast after they start to float. She'd crack those and scramble the ones that didn't reek for the dogs.

 

[3ChickensNADuck]

The oldest I've eaten at room temp is probably two days. But I'm sure eggs can be good for a month at room temp because of natural barriers, but I have the extra fridge space so I don't need to risk it.
Plus I'm a microbiologist and I've seen how quick mold and bacteria can grow at room temp vs 37f (refrigerator temp). From what I've heard its changing from hot to cold to hot to cold which causes the egg shell to expand enough to let bacteria and mold in which rots the egg but I maybe wrong.

 

[JadedPhoenix]

In the old days, it was nothing to store eggs for months in the root cellar and them still be perfectly fine to eat. I even read a blog of where a person stored their eggs and checked them at over a year and more than 99% of them were fine as long as stored properly. Each person will have their own standards. As for the USDA, it is policy that EVERYTHING must have an expiration date so just because someone chose 45 days to be the end all for the eggs, it is by no means accurate to true life. It is a government policy and that is all. And I take their recommendation with as much confidence in that they know what they are doing as I would a random man on the street knowing the gestation length of an elephant.

 

[WthrLady]

22 months....


That said, oldest egg? Probably 50 days....simply because my eggs don't hang around that long.

Grit and motherearth.com did a study on different methods of preservation and keeping eggs.

Honestly, if you set aside your freshest eggs at the end of your laying season, the number you will use during the down season, they will be fine and you will have eggs all winter until they start laying again.

 

[CheshireKat]

I'm not sure if it's illegal, buuut they do sit out here in Germany and I've never seen a store refrigerate them. We do put them there after we purchase, but we never care how long they have been sitting in the fridge and none has gone bad. As my mother says: "We didn't have a "Best by" date in Russia!" lol

 

[wyoDreamer]

There is an article out there that explains the difference between Europe and US eggs.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/nadiaar...egal-in-a-british-supermarket-and-vice-versa/

To summarize the article:
In Britian, the eggs are not washed so the natural protective bloom is still present and they are kept at room/outside temperature. The philosophy is this will ensure good husbandry practices. They also vaccinate the chickens against salmonella.
In the US, the eggs are required to be washed, sanitized and dried; therefore they must be refrigerated.

One of the concerns about refrigeration is that when eggs are taken out of the refrigerator, a layer of condensation may form on the cold egg and that moisture would be a place for the bad stuff to land/form and penetrate through the shell.