Farm Fresh Poached Eggs

After watching the movie Julie & Julia (not reading Mastering the Art of French Cooking) one fact sticks in my head: the key to poached eggs is freshness. A pot of simmering water is needed and gentle stirring, but the true key to making the perfect poached egg is freshness.

A hen typically lays one egg at the same time everyday and at 10 am every morning my lovely Chicken Nugget is kind enough to lay me one large brown egg. Today I collected that egg, brought it into the house and made the most perfect poached egg I've ever seen or tasted. Perfectly held together with thick whites and when cut open the bright orange yolk is still gooey and full of flavor. It is necessary to boil a fresh egg longer because it is denser and takes a minute longer to cook, but you easily get that perfect, still liquid yolk with a hint of firmness on the outside edge.

Fresh eggs have bright orange yolks, thick clear whites and when boiled the whole thing sticks together. BFL (Before Farm Life) I can remember struggling to make a good poached egg, not the perfect poached egg, but a good one and never quite succeeded. My poached eggs would be stringy and the whites would leave a thick film on the water and the pot. The yolk was a pale yellow turning quickly to stone in the boiling water while the whites were thin with no adhesion. I always blamed myself for the poor poached eggs and even went so far as to buy a poacher; which is a tray that sits on top of the boiling water and forces the eggs to stay together. It's all a farce! You don't need a poacher, there's no special swirling method, no preferred boiling point, no unique water, it doesn't matter how you crack it or if you crack it into a bowl first: it's all in the egg.

After I ate my egg and returned to the kitchen to clean up I found the water in the pot perfectly clear. You wouldn't know that I'd just poached an egg. I still washed the pot, but it wasn't a struggle to scrub and rinse and scourer the dried bits of egg white. Also, with the fresh egg it doesn't fall apart the instant it leaves the shell. The egg wants to stay together as the orange yolk sits high and proud on top of its  throne of tenacious whites.

Some people worry that farm eggs aren't commercially produced and therefore not safe to eat. I have never gotten sick from eating a single egg from Nugget. I have a super sensitive tummy that does not take well to drinking the tap water from Port Colborne, so if there was a hint of something unseemly in these eggs my body would have given me the message loud and clear.

Farm eggs are fresh. That's all. If the chicken is kept in a clean area the eggs will be clean too. The only time there is poop on the eggs is when it happens after the egg is laid. Nugget lays her eggs in the clean fresh straw in the bottom of the bunny hutch and each egg is clean and fresh. I've never pulled an egg out dirty, because Nugget is free range and doesn't spend all her time sitting in the same place eating and laying. She's a social butterfly who enjoys all day outdoor adventures, long walks with her friends and breakfast served everyday on the patio.

Today I reached a lifelong goal. Today is the day I made the perfect poached egg and I couldn't have done it without my friendly, faithful and devoted Chicken Nugget. Of all the things Nugget has taught me her eggs have taught me a little more.