We have a flock of 75-100 (Nick can’t remember how many we started with and they won’t stand still for me to count) Rhode Island Reds and Aracanas (the “Easter Egg” chicken that lays blue eggs).  They rotate in the same fields our goats graze and lay their eggs in gypsy wagon-like hen houses, guarded by loud, ugly, and, I am fairly sure, useless guinea fowl (let us pause here while Nick leaps to the defense of the fowl, telling a long story about a confrontation between a hawk, the guinea fowl, and a overly brave young rooster; in case you don’t have 45 minutes for the extended play version, the fowl plus Foghorn Leghorn win).  We move their hen houses and pen every week or so, so these chickens eat a diet high in fresh grass (and stupid grasshoppers).

Right now, the bulk of our eggs are going to the Staunton Grocery (the high-end restaurant gushed over in other sections of this site).  What they leave, we sometimes have for sale at the Staunton Farmers market or on our farm in Greenville (just call Nick at 202-215-7868 to see if we haven’t made all our extras into a HUGE flan before you come out).  Why should you go to the trouble of finding our farm, getting up for the farmers market, or getting all dressed up to eat at the Staunton Grocery for these eggs?

First they are a deal: while they cost more than the antibiotic filled eggs pumped out by debeaked, chickens fed animal byproducts and arsenic and smashed into houses lit 24 hours a day where they lay eggs in their own waste-- our eggs cost less than the "cage free" (translation: their chickens get to see the sun once a day, like prisoners who have yard privileges), "Omega-3" (translation: they don't feed the chickens feed made from slaughterhouse waste) eggs you get at Whole Foods.  Our chickens actually live on pasture -- where they eat grass and bugs, like chickens are supposed to.  They are moved at least once a week to new pasture in an admittedly hilarious mobile chicken coop that Nick drags through our fields.  They are happy chickens -- or at least, amused.  As the chickens get older, the eggs are increasing from medium to large sized, and I think we'll be getting some extra larges soon. 

They are delicious:  If you have never had fresh eggs, you will not believe the buttery rich taste they have.  The yolks are bright orange (not pasty yellow) and the shells are hard.

They are healthy.  Our chickens don't get sick and don't need antibiotics.  They eat a healthy diet, as nature intended, so you get healthy eggs: lower in fat, lower in cholesterol, and higher in all the vitamins and cancer fighting agents you are paying through the nose for at the grocery store.  Scientists -- even real ones and not my quack survivalist friends -- have studied the benefits of eggs from pastured chickens and found: