What’s In Your Food?
Another recent programme was again about Chickens and Eggs. Featuring Jamie Oliver, the show went into detail on eggs, the chicks and chickens behind the eggs, the various eggs and where they’ve come from (Battery, Barn, Free Range etc), along with Chickens and how they’re reared.
As long as I can remember I’ve always bought Free Range Eggs. To me it’s quite a natural thing. Living by and working on a Free Range farm when I was younger gave us an easy way to buy eggs from there, and then since buying for myself, Free Range eggs have always been the obvious choice. So, since buying free range Chicken I figured we were on the right road.
That was until I watched Jamie’s Fowl dinners, where he had examples of liquid egg, liquid egg whites and dried egg (gotta say, made me feel sick seeing it all!), and then explained how mayonnaise, coleslaw, dressings, quiche etc. have all probably either been made with one of these or at least from battery hen eggs. Wow, sickness feeling got worse that’s for sure! My mayonnaise of choice is Hellmanns, and I was very unhappy to discover that this was one to contain battery hen eggs (or dried egg, I forget). Yuk!! A representative from Hellmanns had been invited to this show and he said that from February they would be starting to use free range eggs and by June all products on the shelves should contain free range eggs only, which made me a little happier, although I still will be having a go at making my own mayonnaise for the time being.
So what else do you not really think about. Pastry? Chicken pies not only have pastry that’s probably made with non free range eggs, but most of these fillings that contain chicken probably get the meat from the battery hens after they’ve spent their year laying eggs. Yep, apparently the breasts from these chickens are used in various pie fillings. We don’t tend to buy many pies, but we have done on occasion, and this thought is even more stomach wrenching than intensively reared chickens.
This just reconfirms that your best option is to cook everything from fresh if you can, or if you can’t, check the labels and if you’re not sure then maybe it’s not worth it. I’ll also be learning how to make mayonnaise and pastry, it’ll be fun and handy to know too! Home made quiches are a lot cheaper than buying them, and you get to control what goes in. And if you’re eating out? Don’t be too embarrassed to find out where your food has actually come from. The more awareness there is, the more chance that changes can and will be made.
- January 21st '08
I also have always bought free range eggs, something my mum drilled into me from an early age, but had never given a second thought to my beloved mayo (also a Hellmann’s buyer here!) I’m not going to stop buying it until the new range comes out because I really don’t have the patience to be making my own, but I have cut right back on my consumption in the mean time.
I’ve found a free range mayo
Well, it tastes a bit like salad cream to be honest, a bit heavy on the cider vinegar, still it’ll do until Hellmans get their new version out. Found it in Tesco called umm Simple Delicious I think (the salad cream taste could also be because it’s low cal as we couldn’t get normal!).
However I may still have a bash at my own, just for trying it if nothing else.
Pastry and Pasta is also on the to try list!