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Not all chicken yolks look the same. Some are pale yellow, while others are so orange they are almost red.
But what does it mean? Are egg yolks like lettuce, where a darker color indicates more nutrients?
Fox News Digital spoke to an egg expert to solve the case.
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The color of chicken yolk, cookbook author and backyard chicken expert Lisa Steele told Fox News Digital, “is completely dependent on the hen’s diet.”
Steele, who lives in Maine, is the creator of Fresh Eggs Daily, a website about raising chickens. She is also the author of “The Daily Fresh Egg Cookbook”.
Chicken egg yolks come in a range of colors, from pale yellow to dark orange. (iStock)
“Foods high in xanthophyll and carotene, which are basically pigments called carotenoids, will give a nice dark appearance. orange egg yolks“, said.
Carotene is found in orange foods, he said, such as carrots, mangoes, cantaloupe and pumpkins.
Xanthophyll can be found in leafy green vegetables, such as spinach and kale.
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But while a darker egg yolk doesn’t mean a hen is eating a nutritious, organic or fresh diet, “it probably correlates, since foods with the pigment are also full of other nutrients,” he said.
Still, feed companies and commercial egg farms have discovered solutions to create a darker egg yolk without these. nutrient rich foodsSteele said.
The color of an egg’s yolk depends entirely on the hen’s diet, one expert said. A diet with more carotenes and xanthophylls will produce a darker yolk. (iStock)
These companies “have gotten smart and realized that consumers want to see that bright orange yolk, so they will add things like marigold, paprika, seaweed, corn (and) alfalfa to ‘artificially’ enhance the color.” of the yolk,” he said.
To ensure the more nutritious possible eggs, Steele suggests that customers look for certain labels on cardboard boxes at the supermarket.
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“Pasture-raised” or “free-range” chickens typically lay eggs with a darker, orange yolk, Steele said, “because their diet consists primarily of grasses, weeds and other plants.”
It’s important to note that “cage-free” and “pasture-raised” are not the same thing, he said.
Chickens that have access to the outdoors tend to have a more varied diet and produce darker egg yolks, one expert said. (iStock)
Pasture-raised eggs are the “gold standard,” Steele told Fox News Digital, noting that some “cage-free” hens may still live their lives in a warehouse.
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the eggs of pasture-raised chickens They have less cholesterol and more nutrients, Steele said, because of their healthier and more varied diets.
Yolks aren’t the only thing that comes in different colors.
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The shells also vary.
Unlike yolks, the color of the shell has nothing to do with the nutritional value of the egg, Steele said.
The color of the egg shell has nothing to do with the nutritional value of the egg. (Yulii Zozulia / Ukrinform/Future Publishing via Getty Images)
The color “is based solely on the breed of chicken,” Steele said.
“Some chickens have brown dye, while others have blue and some have none.”
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And that’s not yolk.
