apprider- I just saw a tip on FB to put 1/2 tsp of baking soda in the water when you boil them and that makes peeling easier. I have’t tried it yet.
I have always heard that older eggs peel easier than fresher ones- so when I boil eggs I always take the oldest ones from what I have.
[QUOTE=apprider;6894388]
Agree with all about fresh eggs being so much better.
Does anyone have any tips for peeling fresh hard boiled eggs?[/QUOTE]
The older the egg, the better. That’s where that expanding air pocket in older eggs (again, "older; not “bad”) can be a good thing. I kept eggs from my hens in dated cartons in the fridge specifically marked for hard-boiling. Let them sit between 1-2 weeks before hard-boiling them, & they were always easy to peel.
Fresh-out-of-the-hen’s-a** eggs were NEVER easy to peel, no matter what instructions I followed. I even hold supermarket eggs at least a week before hard-boiling them (especially now that I buy “Nellie’s Eggs”, which are SUPER-fresh). Even a slightly larger air pocket really helps.
Another way is to bake your eggs instead of boil them. They peel soooooo much easier for fresh eggs and the texture and all is the same. To do it, preheat oven to 325*, put the whole eggs in a muffin pan, one egg per hole, and bake for 25-30 minutes. They may have a slight tan/brown spot on the white of the egg that is resting on the bottom of the muffin pan, but for egg salad or deviled eggs it doesn’t show at all, and it doesn’t affect taste.
Sheila
[QUOTE=Chestnut Run;6894582]
Another way is to bake your eggs instead of boil them. They peel soooooo much easier for fresh eggs and the texture and all is the same. To do it, preheat oven to 325*, put the whole eggs in a muffin pan, one egg per hole, and bake for 25-30 minutes. They may have a slight tan/brown spot on the white of the egg that is resting on the bottom of the muffin pan, but for egg salad or deviled eggs it doesn’t show at all, and it doesn’t affect taste.
Sheila[/QUOTE]
REALLY???~!!! Well, I’ll be… I’d never have thought to bake an egg whole. Hmmm - will have to try that this summer.
I can’t always get completely farm-fresh, locals, but Giroux’s are only a few hours away, and veggie-fed, free range. So I figure they’re the next best thing.
[QUOTE=cowboymom;6891394]
Someone told me once too that some people are very allergic to duck eggs so if you don’t feel good after having your duck eggs, maybe you’re allergic![/QUOTE]
In regards to the allergy thing… Several years ago I ate a muffin made with duck eggs, didn’t know it at the time. FWIW…it was delicious. Within about 20 minutes I became VIOLENTLY ill, I mean sicker than I’ve ever been in my life. A bunch of us at the barn ate the muffins, one co worker and I had the exact same symptoms at the same time, everyone else was fine. I’ll never eat a duck egg again.
I have chickens at home. I don’t refrigerate my eggs until I wash them, I usually collect two or three days worth of eggs before I bother with the washing and packaging. I sell them to friends and coworkers, so I feel it’s necessary, but I know many people who don’t wash or refrigerate their eggs…ever.
I NEVER washed any of my eggs until right before using, unless they were particularly dirty, which wasn’t often since I kept our coop & the nests clean. I also never washed any eggs that I gave away. Just told the recipients that the eggs weren’t washed, why, & just advised them to wash them before using.
we only wash ones that somehow managed to get good and pooped on, otherwise, nope.
[QUOTE=cowboymom;6893615]
I once found a nest of eggs that had been missed for quite a long time; I collected them all thinking I would feed the sinkers to the dogs… poured them gently from the bucket to the sink with a few inches of water in it and POW* I thought someone had shot a gun in the room! I was covered in green/blackish nasty slime and nobody in the family would eat an egg for weeks! BAD EGG! Those really bad ones will just explode on you![/QUOTE]
I once gave some fertilized hatching eggs to a friend that had a broody hen. I forgot to tell my friend to mark the eggs. I gave her six eggs and by the time the hatch started the hen had 15 under her. My friend didn’t know which ones were fertilized and which ones weren’t so she left them all in the nest box.
Only one egg hatched. She got the chick out of the nest and then went to clean out the remaining bad eggs. As she was doing that, one of the eggs exploded IN HER FACE. She was covered in green rotten egg innards. She said she dry heaved for twenty minutes (she has a VERY weak stomach.)
She said it looked like nasty, rotten guacamole. As such, she decided to name the one sucessfully hatched chick… Guacamole.
:lol: I can picture the whole thing!! It’s the worst smell ever!
[QUOTE=cowboymom;6891216]
We never refrigerate our eggs, chicken or duck. If you don’t wash them they’ll keep for quite a long time at room temperature. If you do wash them they won’t last quite as long but geez, I want to say 10 days or so? We use them so quickly I don’t keep track. If you gently shake the egg and you can feel the yolk wobble it’s getting old.
It’s not customary to refrigerate them at all ever in England according to a British friend of the family. She thinks it’s weird that her husband keeps the eggs in the fridge! :)[/QUOTE]
Hmmm, depends on the person! I’m British and I keep my eggs in the fridge. (Mainly because I had a cat growing up who used to steal them from the egg basket and roll them off the work surface so they’d smash. He’d eat the yolk and leave the white. The fridge was the only place he couldn’t get to them.)
Here’s the follow-up. I’m a chicken. I ducked the issue and fed them to the dogs. Shhhhh!
A bit afraid of flavor/texture issues and allergies after reading this thread. Oh well.
Yummy… Fresh and free range is the only egg to eat.
Duck eggs are rather rich, and large, they are GREAT if you want to bake an awesome custard! 
I love duck eggs - they are amazing boiled, and my mom liked to use them in her morning smoothies when we could get them. I didn’t find them bad scrambled either - just harder to stir initially.
Greenbean here. What does washing them do to their longevity?
[QUOTE=minnie;6902828]
Greenbean here. What does washing them do to their longevity?[/QUOTE]
Washing removes the natural protective coating (a membrane-like “bloom”) that eggs are coated with when freshly laid to protect the interior (eggshells are porous). Some, but not all, commercial producers replace this with a commercial food-safe coating after washing to increase shelf life. Either way, if you’re going to wash your eggs, it’s best to do it right before use.
[QUOTE=Far_North_Equestrian;6902369]
I love duck eggs - they are amazing boiled, and my mom liked to use them in her morning smoothies when we could get them. I didn’t find them bad scrambled either - just harder to stir initially.[/QUOTE]
This thread is timely for me.
I was given 4 Muskovy ducklings last summer, they turned out to be 2 males and 2 females.
The girls have just started laying - and so far we can not bring ourselves to eat the eggs…
We have had our own chickens for years, and love their eggs…but these, I’m not sure about.
The yolks are very stiff, don’t break down easily if you try to scramble them, and the whites don’t stay intact around the yolk the way I would normally see with the chicken eggs. The whites seem really, well, yucky to me.
Plus, while we are used to seeing our freerange chickens eat all kinds of things, and are relatively ok with that, seeing the ducks drinking happily manure pile runoff water has me concerned.
Are Muscovy eggs good to eat? do these eggs sound normal?
so far the dog loves them scrambled in her breakfast. 
Most of the folks who are asking us for duck eggs are bakers wanting them for cakes. Not one person has requested duck eggs for regular ol’ eating.
We have 2 Welsh Harlequin drakes - Clarence & Clancy. Clancy was supposed to be a girl (HE didn’t get that memo) so we just enjoy their shenanigans. Their baby pool is like raw sewage - def disgusting. How they seem okay with it I’ll never know! Our chickens free range and eat all sorts of stuff but that duck water…OMG!
Our duckling girl WH are coming later on this summer so we will have eggs next year. I’m excited to add it to our farm offerings - excited to bake with them. Most of the folks I know who regularly sell duck eggs for baking have Khaki Campbells (laying machines). I have no idea if there is a big difference between egg tastes in dif duck breeds. Anyone have any opinions on that? I’d love to know. 
We’ve had a few ducks for about 5 years (3 females). At first we were wary of eating the eggs, because we’d heard tales of how they had an “off-flavor.” Finally got up our courage and tried a few–they were delicious! They do have a bigger yolk and thicker, stickier white than chicken eggs. Keeping the heat low while scrambling etc keeps them from getting tough. Haven’t tried hard boiled, but may do that after hearing the good report. As others mentioned, they’re great for baking–I use them 1:1 to replace chicken eggs in most recipes.
Our girls are messy, so I wash the eggs with Comet cleanser (contains bleach) right after gathering them to get rid of all the mud and poo. Store in fridge (they keep for a long time, even pre-washed). I always do the “float” test on them before using so I don’t have any surprises (yuck).
Funny egg story–This winter our girls weren’t laying, despite heat lights. We weren’t sure why, but a few weeks ago DD discovered a young (half-grown?) possum sitting on a nest of eggs in the duck house! We captured him and released him far far away. Since that time, the egg production has increased dramatically. No idea how he got into the pen. It’s very securely fenced with chain-link and chicken wire (overhead too), with no breaks that we could find, so we think he may have slipped through when he was quite small, lived under the duck house, dining on eggs and bird food–and eventually grew too large to get out again. Probably also a little intimidated by our “guard gander” that lives with the ducks! We were thankful that he left the birds alone.
[QUOTE=Fred;6908625]
This thread is timely for me.
I was given 4 Muskovy ducklings last summer, they turned out to be 2 males and 2 females.
The girls have just started laying - and so far we can not bring ourselves to eat the eggs…
We have had our own chickens for years, and love their eggs…but these, I’m not sure about.
The yolks are very stiff, don’t break down easily if you try to scramble them, and the whites don’t stay intact around the yolk the way I would normally see with the chicken eggs. The whites seem really, well, yucky to me.
Plus, while we are used to seeing our freerange chickens eat all kinds of things, and are relatively ok with that, seeing the ducks drinking happily manure pile runoff water has me concerned.
Are Muscovy eggs good to eat? do these eggs sound normal?
so far the dog loves them scrambled in her breakfast. ;)[/QUOTE]
They aren’t drinking the water…they are sifting for goodies! That’s how ducks/geese eat naturally, they sieve the water through little “sieve grooves” in their bills to trap the good stuff (bugs, bits of plant material, etc.). I use duck and goose eggs in recipes, but not to eat fried or scrambled. I just don’t like the extra white in a duck/goose egg (personal preference). We ate them growing up, and I could tell the difference between the chicken eggs and the duck eggs, even when mom scrambled them and didn’t tell us which was which. The flavor isn’t bad, the texture is just different.
The baking soda trick works for peeling eggs. I don’t measure though I tend to dump a bit more than 1/2 tablespoon - it seems to work better w/more.
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