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Unlaid Eggs

An old laying hen

A laying hen. This one’s still going strong. Older birds will have richer fat, and deeper flavor than younger birds, or birds grown in captivity. They’re not as tender though, not by a long shot.

For the most part, we don’t appreciate older animals much. We want things young, tender, and easy to chew. Old dairy cattle are an unwanted, tough by-product of industry, the same goes for old milking ewes (and their unwanted male offspring necessary to keep them producing goat milk for cheese). Old laying hens are the same. Once the little egg engines are done, they might be buried, composted, or hopefully, used for anything at all, but from what I can see, typically some sort of feed, for someone or something (they used to go into Campbells chicken soup, but not anymore). There’s some exceptions, and you can see a paradigm shift, albeit a subtle one, mostly among chefs thanks to Chef Magnus Nilsson, who famously started purchasing only retired dairy cattle for their complex flavor and different qualities from conventional beef.

Last week I had a chance to help find a home for some old laying hens a couple was looking to relocate from their farm. I thought it was a good chance to do the hens a solid, and give them the culinary appreciation they deserve, as well as being my maiden voyage for chicken processing. (For the record, the people raising the birds were well aware that a new home meant a stock pot). If you know anything about birds, an old laying hen is not a tender chicken nugget–just the opposite, even slow cooking will only render them slightly less chewy. They’re generally unappreciated, and there’s undoubtedly a lot of waste that gets created not using them in the commercial egg industry.

Chicken cone of death

The chicken death cone. Using this makes harvesting and processing go pretty fast. Also allowed me to let the blood collect by itself instead of having to aim it in a bowl as with lamb.

While the chickens may be old, and the meat may be tough, I’d like to think it just means they have different gifts to give. The broth one of those old laying hens can make is fantastic, but the real treats I was looking forward to, lover of whole animal utilization that I am, were the odd parts. For starters, I knew there would be the most golden fat to render for shmaltz, (it was almost neon yellow in hue) and poultry blood for black pudding and sausage.

Chicken Blood Sausage (2)
Poultry blood sausage.
Chicken Shmaltz or chicken fat
The birds also gave the richest colored shmaltz I’ve seen.

Those were just appetizers before the main attraction though: unlaid eggs. Eggs from the inside of a bird are something most people have never seen or thought about, and would probably not like to. I can understand a little aversion to something new, but at the end of the day, they’re just eggs, and I like omelets, custards and pasta. I’d known about unlaid eggs for years, ever since I read about them in Giuliano Bugialli’s the Fine Art of Italian Cooking–a great blend of Italian culinary history narrated by the famous writers militant adherence to tradition. Like a few other things, the eggs are a type of almost unattainable foodie catnip, and a rare ingredient a lot of chefs would kill to try.

Unlaid or unborn chicken eggs

Unlaid eggs in their natural state. If you wanted to use them whole, the tiny one would be what I’d use. The larger eggs I would use as egg yolk. Also note the deep golden fat deposits that can be rendered for really good shmaltz.

More Than Macabre Novelty

In one sense, unlaid, or immature eggs (some might refer to them as unborn, but that’s a little macabre for food speak) are just like eggs you’d by at the store. In another sense, they’re completely different. For one, there’s no egg white, which means that they’re basically 100% fat. Fat is good. The other, part, that most people will probably find odd or off-putting, is that there may or may not be immature shell coating developing on the eggs, either way, there’s going to be a sort of very fine membrane that needs to be navigated. To get your burning questions and the obvious eyeball comparisons out of the way, yes, some older recipes call for the eggs to be eaten whole, or cooked in soup. I tried them that way, and, although they could be poached and gently peeled, or small eggs eaten whole, it’s much easier (and less ghoulish to most people I’d wager) to simply pop the immature eggs and use where you would egg yolk. And what an egg yolk it is. 

Unlaid or unborn chicken eggs

Unlaid eggs are one of the key ingredients of cibreo.

You’ve never seen an egg yolk like them. The texture is beyond rich, and where a typical egg yolk would be runny, an unlaid egg is thick like melted cheese–almost as if it’s been par-cooked. That, combined with the intense orange color you get from a diet of a bird doing real bird things outside, in nature, is a recipe for a very special ingredient. A special ingredient for who you ask? Well, of course I’m not the first, and the best article I found on it featured the chicken wizard and larger than life Dan Barber of Blue Hill at Stone Barns, who had an epiphany about the eggs after eating a bowl of pasta in Tuscany made from the immature eggs. After he went back home, he quickly instituted the process of unlaid egg harvesting at his restaurant from spent laying hens. I’ll link to New York Times article on that at the end of the post.

Cibreo recipe from Giulianno Bugialli

From The Fine Art of Italian Cooking by Giulianno Bugialli.

Cooking

So, what the heck could you do with unlaid eggs? Just about anything you could do with a really good egg yolk. First, pasta. If you’ve ever made homemade pasta and just used a whole egg, some water and flour, you’ll be in for a treat making it with only egg yolks. The fat of the yolk (and lack of water that can eventually cause the dough to oxidize and discolor) ,makes for most tender, succulent, bouncy noodle. I can pretty much guarantee it’s the best pasta you’ve had (gnocchi too). The second, and my favorite so far, is using them as a thickening liaison. Thickening sauces and soups with egg, or just egg yolk is an old-time thing, most people know the famous Grecian avgolemono soup, and carbonara, but you could use the method anywhere you’d like to gently tighten up a sauce, off the heat, of course.

Cibreo recipe, a stew of chicken livers with cream and unlaid eggs

Cibreo, my version. Essentially fried chicken livers in gravy, on toast, but I skipped the testicles and cockscombs. The egg thickens the sauce something delicious.

There was one recipe I’d wanted to make for years out of Bugialli’s book I mentioned before. It’s called cibreo, and it’s a sort of fricasee or quick stew made from everything but the cluck. Dating back at least 500 years, the sauce is still well known in Northern Italy, although, just like the use of wild beet greens has generally switched from feral Beta vulgaris to chard, the sauce in it’s original form (taken from the Oxford Companion to Italian Cooking) used everything from cockcombs, wattles, testicles, livers, hearts and unlaid eggs (obviously created to use perishable, nutrient-dense offal) is now pretty much just stewed chicken livers, sometimes thickened with egg. Either way, it’s an excellent dish, and you don’t need to butcher your own chickens to taste it. See my modern adaptation here.

So, while they won’t be for everyone unlaid eggs are an interesting thing to know about, especially if you harvest your own birds.

Further Reading

NY Times: Chef Dan Barber has an unlaid egg epiphany

Dan Barber coloring chicken eggs red by feeding birds bell peppers 

Cibreo: Rennaissance chicken livers on toast 

Giuliano Bugialli: The Fine Art of Italian Cooking 

The Gaurdian: Old dairy cattle are a delicacy

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Previous Post: « Cibreo: Renaissance Chicken Livers on Toast
Next Post: Wild Grape, Aronia, or Elderberry BBQ (Spicy!) »

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Jane Steinberg

    March 14, 2020 at 4:13 pm

    The egg sac was always the special part of every stewed hen. As the youngest, I usually got it, as I also got the gizzards and livers. YUMMMM!!!!

    Reply
  2. Tim Maguire

    March 15, 2020 at 10:40 am

    A fascinating post as always, Alan. And with regard to ‘Old dairy cattle are an unwanted, tough by-product of industry’ I think we should follow the practice of farmers in Galicia, Spain. This article in The Guardian explains… https://www.theguardian.com/global/2015/oct/11/raising-the-steaks-meet-the-elderly-spanish-cows-destined-for-dinner-plates

    Reply
    • Alan Bergo

      March 15, 2020 at 10:53 am

      Thanks Tim. That’s a great article, and is exactly what my friend Chef Jonathan Gans at the Bachelor farmer in Minneapolis is doing, although his cows are a little younger at 7 years. I still haven’t tasted it.

      Reply
      • Tim Maguire

        March 15, 2020 at 4:54 pm

        I’m so glad to hear that Alan. We should give these hard working ladies more respect!

        Reply
  3. Wren

    April 1, 2020 at 8:58 am

    Oh, how I love seeing articles like this. On our homestead, we butcher our own meat as well–and with a flock of poultry, I have a special respect and appreciation for the bits that most folks don’t even know exist. I have usually included the unlaid eggs in the stew pot along with the lungs, liver, and gizzard, but I hadn’t tried using them as an ingredient of their own. Thanks for the idea!

    Found you through your comment on Insteading (I’m a writer there). As a forager and homesteader and cook for my family, I am really enjoing scrolling through your site!

    Reply
  4. Lisa C.

    June 8, 2020 at 6:51 pm

    I came across your article as I am trying to search where to obtain these deliciousness in the US. I come from Taiwan, and we have this street food called “Brine Chicken”. I am not sure whether it is to cut cost, but they use mostly retired hen. The result is our accessibility to unlaid eggs, fallopian tube (with eggs attached), among other organs). The dish is simple. All the ingredients are boiled and chilled. You pick the items you would like and they are tossed in brine, sesame oil, and white pepper. It is simple, healthy, and perfect for a summer day.

    https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-3WUo7h0TTs0/Wm6Wj0SG41I/AAAAAAAAAgE/GhnmuqQ6sOsidp6vhxzvBddIDLjvROXOgCLcBGAs/s1600/%25E9%25B9%25BD%25E6%25B0%25B4%25E9%259B%259E.jpg

    Reply
  5. Carolyn McMillan

    July 30, 2020 at 1:46 am

    My Italian maternal grandmother used to drop these unlaid eggs into her chicken soup broth after she’d gutted and cleaned the chickens. As a little girl I would go crazy for them in the soup. Now, when I make chicken soup I always separate the whites of a few eggs and drop the yolks into my strained broth. I wish I could find the ones she would use…but of course the chickens available to me are from grocery stores.

    Reply
  6. Beatrice

    November 27, 2020 at 6:49 am

    5 stars
    I just ran across this article after shopping in my local market. For sale were something I had never seen: “frango do campo com miudos.” Country chicken with…kids? As in children? Came home to do some Googling. Sure enough, an old tough stewer with tubes and baby eggs inside. They are 2 Euros 55 cents per kilo. That’s less than $1.50/lb. Coastal Portugal is a foodie’s dream!!!

    Reply

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