Americans do a lot of foolish things, but refrigerating their eggs is not one of them.
There is a good reason: eggs are washed before they’re sold in the US, which removes the egg’s cuticle (a natural protective coating). This process reduces the risk of bacterial contamination, and, when combined with refrigeration, extends the shelf life of the egg. That matters in a country with a distributed population as geographically vast as the U.S., where food often travels longer distances before reaching the consumer. Refrigerating eggs is a solution to a logistical challenge not present in Europe.
I like to point this out because a European unaware of this difference might visit America, refuse to refrigerate their eggs (believing their own cultural practices to be superior and more “natural”) and end up with salmonella. It’s ironic because getting sick in another country due to ignorance of local customs, while assuming your own culture is better, is a very American thing to do. I guess the apple didn’t fall far from the tree.
As an American, I heard that the euros don’t refrigerate their eggs. And I thought “well that’s good… One less thing to refrigerate!” And I stopped doing it about 15 years ago.
I have not had salmonella once. Worst case is that about once every two years, I crack a rotten egg into my breakfast scramble and it smells like Satan’s hangover farts. But ya know, ya win some, ya lose some.
If you can get local fresh eggs you might not need to refrigerate them. We get them from a relative who has a few chickens and more eggs than they can eat to share.
Totally down with that idea. I want to have chickens in my back yard, but I spend a lot of time out of town, so I’d need to figure out how to get my housemates to take care of them when I’m not around.
I’m from Europe, and while I know I don’t need to have my eggs in the fridge I do so anyways. I don’t think that the cold will hurt. Maybe they will last even longer!
I don’t get it. We tend to think of raw animal products as either exotic or gross (French steak tartare, Korean yookhwe, Italian carpaccio, German mett, etc). Even filet Américain, despite its name, is something most Americans have never heard of. We don’t really have our own equivalent to these dishes. Maybe over-easy eggs?
Wait until they hear the one on the right wasn’t in the fridge 🙀
It came out a chickens what
You monster!
Americans do a lot of foolish things, but refrigerating their eggs is not one of them.
There is a good reason: eggs are washed before they’re sold in the US, which removes the egg’s cuticle (a natural protective coating). This process reduces the risk of bacterial contamination, and, when combined with refrigeration, extends the shelf life of the egg. That matters in a country with a distributed population as geographically vast as the U.S., where food often travels longer distances before reaching the consumer. Refrigerating eggs is a solution to a logistical challenge not present in Europe.
I like to point this out because a European unaware of this difference might visit America, refuse to refrigerate their eggs (believing their own cultural practices to be superior and more “natural”) and end up with salmonella. It’s ironic because getting sick in another country due to ignorance of local customs, while assuming your own culture is better, is a very American thing to do. I guess the apple didn’t fall far from the tree.
As an American, I heard that the euros don’t refrigerate their eggs. And I thought “well that’s good… One less thing to refrigerate!” And I stopped doing it about 15 years ago.
I have not had salmonella once. Worst case is that about once every two years, I crack a rotten egg into my breakfast scramble and it smells like Satan’s hangover farts. But ya know, ya win some, ya lose some.
If you can get local fresh eggs you might not need to refrigerate them. We get them from a relative who has a few chickens and more eggs than they can eat to share.
Totally down with that idea. I want to have chickens in my back yard, but I spend a lot of time out of town, so I’d need to figure out how to get my housemates to take care of them when I’m not around.
I’m from Europe, and while I know I don’t need to have my eggs in the fridge I do so anyways. I don’t think that the cold will hurt. Maybe they will last even longer!
Same, once they have been cold their protective coating can suffer, so keep that in mind and don’t leave them out at a later time.
Thanks, I’ll keep that in mind. Although, I don’t really have any other place to keep them than my fridge, so they’ll probably stay there.
Just call it raw and they’ll be into it
I don’t get it. We tend to think of raw animal products as either exotic or gross (French steak tartare, Korean yookhwe, Italian carpaccio, German mett, etc). Even filet Américain, despite its name, is something most Americans have never heard of. We don’t really have our own equivalent to these dishes. Maybe over-easy eggs?
Why would you keep eggs in a fridge? I just leave them in a basket on the counter top.
Because my country’s egg supply chain makes them require refrigeration.