Eggs are a valuable food product, because they are a source of protein, which is almost completely absorbed by the body.

When buying in a store, we are sure of their freshness, but often everything can turn out to be wrong. When buying, determining freshness is rather problematic, but at home it is much easier to do.

It is important to be able to determine the freshness of the purchased product in order to save yourself from numerous diseases and eat healthy and high-quality food.

The appearance of the eggs may indicate how long ago they were laid by the hen. Fresh ones will have a slightly matte surface, while old ones look smoother, the surface of the shell resembles a glossy film. However, these figures will not be accurate, because in stores they are often washed and rubbed, making them cleaner and more attractive to the buyer.

Pay attention to the uniformity of the eggs in the tray.

From the same batch, they have the same size and color, otherwise we can say that they were demolished at different times and stale specimens may come across among them. Rancid ones will smell bad and are usually removed from sale.

If you take an egg and shake it, you can determine its freshness. The fact is that during storage, the contents begin to dry out and separate from their natural shells, so the contents hang out. It is not recommended to buy these.

Learning to check freshness at home

It is much easier to check eggs bought at home than in a store. There are more ways and means to do this, among the main ones are the following:

• Check by immersion in water;
• Immersion in saline solution;
• Shell temperature measurement;
• Determination of freshness by appearance protein and yolk;
• Smell detection.

Except folk remedies there are instrumental and laboratory tests to determine freshness. If you shine it with ultraviolet light, it begins to glow bright red. Such a glow speaks of its freshness.

If the color turns purple, this indicates that it has been demolished for a very long time.

However, it is not necessary to use ultraviolet light. Can be illuminated with an ordinary lamp. Fresh in the shell will never have dark spots, and in the case when such spots are present, that is, they are not worth it.

Water to help or how to check freshness without leaving home?

Very well proven method of immersion in water. Fresh will sink, and not fresh will float. The fact is that over time, under the shell, the air chamber increases, which makes it possible to determine the timing of the laid egg.

If salt is dissolved in water, this will make the solution denser and help to more accurately identify freshness, since eggs will float better in such a solution.

When the egg lies on the bottom - it was laid two or three days ago, if it balances between the surface of the water and the bottom - the period is about a week. If one end is immersed, and the other is directed upwards and fluctuates when the water container is stirred, this means that its freshness is about 10-15 days.

Visual determination of freshness by internal content

If you are not sure about the freshness of the purchased eggs, take one from the batch and break it. The white of a fresh egg is homogeneous and transparent. The yolk should have a natural convex shape. If it is stale, the yolk will be flat, and the protein is characterized by a heterogeneous structure and may have cloudy areas.

Determination of shell odor

By this parameter, you can determine how long ago the egg was laid. The thing is that the shell is able to absorb various odors. The shell of freshly laid eggs smells like lime. The longer it is stored, the more varied the smells can be. Freshness can also be determined after cooking. It is believed that fresh is very difficult to clean. The older his age, the better the shell departs from the boiled protein.

Determination of freshness by shell temperature

This method requires some experience. Its essence is as follows: you need to wash the purchased egg, shake it, and then touch the blunt and sharp end with the tip of your tongue.

If fresh, then the blunt end will be a little warmer than the pointed one. If this temperature is the same, then it is old.

You should also carefully study the date indicated on the package. Often, due to inattention, we buy stale products, so you should be vigilant.

Egg freshness determined by twisting

This method of determination will be useful to those who have already seen how a spoiled egg rotates. The fact is that the fresh one practically does not rotate or rotates no more than a few times around its axis, the spoiled one will rotate a little longer.

Shelf life of eggs

Depending on the age of the laid eggs, they are divided into two categories: dietary and dining. If the freshness is less than 7 days after demolition, it is considered dietary. From the 8th day it goes into the category of canteens. You need to store no more than 25 days, it is best to store in the refrigerator. However, even at room temperature they are pretty well preserved. If it is not possible to store in the cold, then you need to place them in a dark place.

Those purchased at the bazaar should be stored for no more than three weeks, since there is no way to know the exact date of their demolition.

Egg white can be stored in the refrigerator for about 2-4 days, the yolk is stored for no more than 2 days.

Determination of the freshness of quail eggs

Quail eggs are valuable because they are a source of protein and are able to restore the body's immunity. They contain much more minerals and vitamins than chicken. Methods for determining the freshness of quail eggs are the same as for determining chicken.

However, there is one interesting method that allows you to more accurately determine the freshness of a quail egg. To do this, you need an electronic scale. When weighed, it should weigh about 12 grams, stale will weigh exactly half as much (About 4-6 g). This difference can be felt if you hold a fresh egg and a spoiled one in different hands.

How long does a boiled egg keep?

It is recommended to store no more than 1-3 days. The most optimal storage time is 24 hours. For better preservation, they should be wrapped in paper. The shelf life depends on how much they were cooked and under what conditions they are stored.

In the refrigerator, hard-boiled eggs can be stored for about 7 days, peeled, hard-boiled eggs are stored for 5 days.

A spoiled boiled egg can be checked for the smell and consistency of the protein. If there is an unpleasant musty smell, then you should not eat it. Stale cooked protein loses its elastic structure, becomes layered and, when rubbed with a finger, can remain on the hands.

Remember, only fresh products make your diet richer and healthier. Don't neglect your health. Even long boiling does not always kill pathogenic bacteria that develop in stale eggs.

The video tells how not to become a victim of rotten eggs.

By purchasing eggs, we are essentially buying a pig in a poke. After all, the stamps on the packaging do not always correspond to reality, and they are completely absent on the market when selling a homemade product.

When properly stored, eggs can remain edible for more than a month. But not always at poultry farms and at the points of sale of eggs, the necessary conditions are met, thereby accelerating the spoilage of the product.

In order to make sure the freshness of the eggs or determine its degree, you can use a simple trick, which we will discuss below.

Checking eggs for freshness in water

You can easily and quickly determine the freshness of eggs using salted water.

Fresh eggs have practically no air inside, and the shell fits snugly against the membrane, so if you lower such an egg into a container of salted water, it will sink to the bottom and take horizontal position.

When stored through the pores of the egg shell, air gradually penetrates inside, the membrane moves away from the shell, thereby increasing the air bag. The more the egg is stored, the more air inside, which, if stored improperly and at high temperatures, promotes the development of bacteria and the rapid deterioration of the product. Such an egg, when lowered into water, will float on the surface.

With the help of water, you can not only check the freshness of eggs, but also determine its degree. By conducting a simple test, you can find out if the purchased eggs are suitable for poaching and diet food or they are only suitable for hard-boiling and adding to a salad.

Determining the freshness of eggs in a glass of water

1. The first seven days, eggs are considered dietary and can be used to make poached eggs, scrambled eggs, biscuits, as well as various desserts and other dishes where the freshness of the product is important. If an egg, immersed in a glass of water, sinks to the very bottom and takes a horizontal position, it is undoubtedly fresh and can be used for any dish.
2. Eggs with freshness from a week to two will float a little with a blunt end up, but the sharp one will still touch the bottom. Such eggs can be boiled hard, used for frying an omelette, but when poached, such an egg will simply scatter in water. If you break a two-week-old egg into a pan, the protein will spread over the pan like a pancake and you won’t get a beautiful scrambled egg.
3. Eggs that are over two weeks old but still edible will take vertical position in the center of the glass with the blunt end up. The sharp end no longer touches the bottom. Such eggs can only be used for ten minutes or more from the moment of boiling and used in salads or other dishes as needed. The advantage of such not the first freshness of eggs is that, unlike fresh ones, they are always perfectly cleaned.
4. If, during the test, the egg floats to the surface of the water and takes a horizontal position, it is definitely spoiled, the process of decomposition has begun in it and it can no longer be used for food.

How to check the freshness of quail eggs in water?

The structure is the same as that of chicken, so you can check their freshness in water based on the information described above. Fresh eggs will sink to the bottom, and spoiled ones will float to the surface of the water in a glass.

Now you know how to find out the freshness of eggs in water and you can determine it at any time at home. But to keep eggs fresh for as long as possible, you do not need to wash them before sending them to the refrigerator immediately after purchase. Yes, and it is better to check for freshness in water immediately before use. Upon contact with water, the protective shell is washed off the eggs, which covers the pores, which significantly reduces the shelf life of the product, since air begins to penetrate much faster.

A sign of the quality of a chicken egg is its freshness. In appearance, it is sometimes difficult to determine whether it has deteriorated. Knowledge simple secrets determining the freshness of eggs will help not to make a mistake when buying.

The suitability for eating chicken eggs depends on their age and storage conditions. In the hot season, this product deteriorates much faster. How to determine the freshness of chicken eggs?

Checking eggs for freshness when buying

First of all, it is important to look at the surface of the eggs in the tray. Newly laid eggs have a matte surface, while older ones have a slightly glossy finish. This method does not always work - sellers sometimes wash their goods, and this affects the appearance. It is useful to compare all the eggs in the tray: they are from the same batch and should be the same color. If they differ, it is possible that older ones were added to the fresh ones.

Another way is to shake the egg. With such a simple experiment, it is easy to determine the "talker", that is, a product worthless for consumption. During storage, the egg dries out, its inner shell separates from the shell and the contents “dangle”.

Checking eggs for freshness at home

We will not dwell on complex experiments to determine freshness, such as measuring the temperature of an egg in different parts(a fresh one has a blunt end warmer than a sharp one) or ultraviolet transillumination (fresh eggs are bright red, old ones are lavender).

Checking the freshness of eggs at home can be much easier. You just need to lower it into a concentrated solution of kitchen salt. If the egg lies at the bottom of the dish, then its age is not more than a week. If the blunt end rises up, but is still sharp at the bottom, then the egg is about 10 days old. If it floats in solution, the egg is already stored for about 2 weeks. And if it floats like a float, half out of the water, it is better to throw it away.

Having broken an egg into, you can say with a high degree of certainty whether it is fresh or not quite. This is not the case when the stench will tell you that the product is spoiled. An egg may be usable, but not suitable for storage, if its protein immediately spreads over. In fresh - the protein is denser and more viscous.

The white of a fresh egg is transparent, the yolk is elastic, its shell is dense. If the yolk of a broken egg immediately spreads and mixes with the protein, its freshness is doubtful.

A boiled fresh egg is cleaned much worse, a thin film between the shell and the protein is held tightly.

The color of the yolk does not indicate freshness, but depends on the diet of the chicken. Rich yellow-orange yolks are found in village chickens that feed on grain, grass and worms, as well as in birds in poultry farms, which are fed specially formulated compound feeds with additives for color.

Before you buy eggs, you need to inspect the product - its good quality can be determined already by its appearance. Fresh chicken eggs have a matte surface, and over time, gloss appears on them. The more shine, the older the product. It is useful to pay attention to the uniformity of the color of only a dozen in the cells - one batch should look the same if it does not contain foreign (stale) units. You can also verify the good quality by shaking the eggs - during long-term storage, the contents dry out and begin to fluctuate inside.

But in a hurry it is not always possible to check the quality. At home, you can test eggs for freshness without breaking them. This will allow the unscrupulous seller to return the unusable product.

Methods for determining freshness

All methods for checking eggs for freshness can be divided into the following categories:

• visual - by marking on the product, the condition of the shell and smell;
• technical - using devices or meters;
• test - placing the egg in a certain environment and observation.

All of these methods allow you to determine the quality of the product without opening its shell, that is, they are non-destructive. They are quite simple in execution and are available for use at home.

Folk recipes

First you need to look at the date of manufacture, as well as the expiration date on the package. To determine the quality of the product visually, you need to examine the shell of raw eggs. The surface of fresh ones will be matte and rough, stale ones will be smooth with a glossy sheen, as well as a bluish tint if they are white. Next, you need to smell the product - the one-day one smells of lime, and over time, the aromas of surrounding objects are mixed in.

You can check eggs for freshness by testing methods using certain manipulations. Here is some of them:

1. 1. Load a raw egg into the water is a well-known and reliable test method to determine its age. To do this, fill a glass or other container with water to a height of 10 cm from the bottom and lower the test object into the liquid: drowned - fresh, remained afloat, which means it was stored for more than a month, deteriorated, and it is dangerous to eat it. The air chamber inside tends to increase during long-term storage, therefore, in a submerged position, the egg can be at different levels, by which you can find out the degree of its freshness. A week-old product lies at the bottom, a two-week-old product is approximately in the middle.
2. 2. Squeeze the product - you will feel a slight vibration of the contents, then shake. A fresh egg will not react to this in any way, and distinct fluctuations indicate that the product cannot be used for food.
3. 3. Rotate the product on the table to determine whether it is boiled or raw, a method known to many. It is also used for the study of qualitative characteristics. A fresh egg spins with difficulty, very sluggishly. Old objects behave almost like boiled ones.

There are other ways to check eggs for freshness, but already with a violation of their integrity. The shell of fresh products is tough and hard, it is difficult to peel off the boiled product, and with age it softens. Having broken a raw egg, they examine the smell and contents - the fresh product has no aroma. If there is a smell, the food has gone bad. The stench indicates that this happened a long time ago. The transparent, jelly-like protein does not spread over the surface, the yolk is elastic and rises above the protein - signs of freshness.

Technical ways

The instrumental determinants of egg quality include an ovoscope, special equipment with ultraviolet radiation, weighing devices and conventional light bulbs. Except for scales, everyone else technical means provide translucence of the object with light rays (including solar).

Since ancient times, people have been eating bird eggs. Most often in refrigerators there are chicken. But dietary quail also came into fashion. Duck and goose are well suited for baking. The exotic ostrich is pleasing to the eye, striking in its size. The restaurants are ready to offer dishes even with eggs of turtles and crocodile.

Today we will talk about a product that is almost 96-97% absorbed by the human body. It is eaten boiled, fried and raw. Many dishes also include eggs: salads, pastries, minced meats, desserts, creams.

A chicken egg is rich in vitamins, amino acids and trace elements necessary for life human body. The composition includes potassium, calcium, phosphorus, magnesium, iron, iodine and almost the entire list of vitamins.

This product improves blood formation, protects our eyes from diseases, strengthens the immune system.

Harm eggs

The product is contraindicated in people with diabetes, obesity, as well as individual intolerance, allergy to it. There is a risk of getting sick with salmonella if you eat raw eggs. But a stale, spoiled product can bring the greatest harm. Such eggs will give dishes bad smell, color, taste, and will also cause poisoning.

Selection and storage

It is almost impossible to determine by eye how long ago a chicken laid an egg, not everyone has a special device, such as an ovoscope, and checking with a flashlight in a store will look ridiculous and ridiculous. Although there is one way to visually determine the freshness of an egg. Remember, color and size do not affect quality in any way. An egg will be fresh if its shell is dull, clean and without any damage (even a small crack indicates spoilage).

When buying in a store, pay attention to the labeling. Manufacturers put a stamp on the shell indicating which category the egg belongs to. Diet eggs are marked with a red stamp with the date of manufacture, as well as a varietal label. Such product must be purchased within a seven-day period.

Eggs older than this period are table eggs, which have their own marking:

• "O" - selected, large;
• "1" - medium;
• "2" - small eggs.

Store the product at a temperature of 5 to 8 degrees with a plus sign, no more than one month.

Storage rules:

• The storage location must not be damp.
• Eggs should be washed just before use.
• Strong-smelling foods should not be stored nearby.
• It is recommended to lay the eggs in the tray with the sharp end down.

Arriving home, you can easily determine how fresh the egg is.

First way: the most common and practically accurate. With the help of ordinary water, we learn not only freshness, but how long the egg has been “made”. To conduct a home examination, you must take a glass or some other transparent container, as well as cold water. Dip the purchased product into the liquid and determine the degree of freshness by its position. A week-old egg will lie horizontally on the bottom of the container, older than 10-14 days will raise its blunt end by 45 degrees, stored for more than two weeks will hang in this position in the middle of the glass. What floats to the surface is best disposed of as soon as possible.

Some experts on chicken eggs it is advised to use concentrated brine. The indicators remain the same.

Second way: determination of freshness using a light source. A lamp or even sunlight will do to test. A fairly fresh egg will show through, but an old one will not, or dark areas will be noticeable in it.

Third way: carried out using an ultraviolet lamp (who has it at home). It is necessary to direct the light to the tray with this product. Fresh eggs will glow bright red, spoiled eggs will turn lavender.

Fourth way: will help to check not only the freshness of the product, but also hearing. Between the shell and the sac with protein and yolk there is a small cavity with air. The longer the egg is stored, the larger this cavity becomes. To check, you need to bring the product to your ear and shake it. No sounds will come from a fresh egg, but a stale one will flounder. This method can be used in the store and in the market.

Fifth way: used if the egg does not need to be boiled in the shell. For examination, you must take a flat plate or saucer. Sometimes they say that you can even use a frying pan. But in this case, the saying may work: "A fly in the ointment spoils a barrel of honey." So, one rotten egg will spoil not only previously checked eggs, but will spoil the whole dish, and the mood too. Therefore, it is best to test the product in a separate container one at a time. After cracking an egg, look at its structure. Fresh will have a clear white sticking to the yolk. The yolk itself should be elastic, high rounded. If the protein is cloudy, spreads on a plate, and the yolk has a not so dense consistency, then you have a spoiled egg in front of you. This will be indicated by an unpleasant pungent odor. Such a product is not even suitable as an auxiliary ingredient for dishes.

When buying eggs at retail outlets, do not forget about the recommendations for determining freshness and storage rules. Let the dishes with this product benefit and delight you and your loved ones.

Video: how to check eggs for freshness