Free-Range, Farm Fresh

Kramer had Little Jerry Seinfeld, now we have our own rooster, I mean chicken. Well, we don’t exactly have a chicken running around in our backyard, but we do have the next best thing: eggs from a friend’s chickens.

The egg industry is a sad one in most industrialized countries. Hundreds of chickens are crammed into cages, forced to stand on little pegs, see little or no sunlight, and just lay eggs. This results in unhealthy chickens laying unhealthy eggs. Just look at the colour of the yolks. In Calgary, the yolks of the eggs I bought were a dull straw colour. I tried different eggs claiming to be high in omega fats, with little improvement. It’s unfortunate, because there are free-range eggs out there, but not usually in the grocery stores, and most people are unwilling to pay the much higher price for them.

In France, the situation is much better. There are very affordable free-range eggs available at the grocery store. I am often skeptical of labels such as ‘organic’ and ‘free-range’, knowing it can be easy to make these claims, regardless of the actual farming technique, but the eggs I buy here are significantly better than what I bought in Calgary.

Many chickens do run freely here. All I need to do is walk five minutes down my street to find a home with a few chickens in the yard. The owners are not farmers, just own a couple of chickens for their use. I do not notice a foul smell coming from their yard; I only hear the occasional cockadoodledoo early on a summer morning when our windows are open.

Urban foodies in Canadian cities are now fighting for the right to raise chickens in their yards. Currently, there is a trial being run in Calgary and Edmonton to see if it is manageable, and Vancouver is close to passing a by-law allowing the practice. Hopefully the trials will be successful, and those wanting to keep chickens will be able to do so.

Now back to our eggs. Gilles and I have made friends with a French couple that live in our town. They have a virtual zoo in their yard, and amongst the dog, pigeons, geese, rooster, and bunnies, they have several egg-laying chickens running around. When I arrived at her house yesterday, three chickens strutted in front of my car. They roam freely, eating grass, oats, and corn. The yolks are so yellow that scrambled eggs look fluorescent. And now I am buying half a dozen eggs from her every week. Healthy chickens, healthy eggs!