Green Egg White – why?

[Carole]

I was frying eggs this morning sunny-side up. When I cracked them into the skillet, I could see that one of the organic (truly free-range from a local farmer) eggs had a green egg white. It was very fresh and didn't smell at all. I'm thinking that this was most likely due to something in the chickens diet but I'm really curious what would cause this. I know that you can get the dreaded green ring around the yolk when you don't properly hard boil eggs, but these were just being fried. Yolk looked fine, a nice yellow.

Any ideas?

[judiu]

Does your farmer keep a specific breed of chicken? I know that some hens lay eggs with greenish or pale blue colored shells (some one here had a bunch of them as an avatar, but I can't remember who ) , so perhaps it was a breed trait? Was it REALLY green, or just sort of tinged? HTH!

[Carole]

Does your farmer keep a specific breed of chicken? I know that some hens lay eggs with greenish or pale blue colored shells (some one here had a bunch of them as an avatar, but I can't remember who ) , so perhaps it was a breed trait? Was it REALLY green, or just sort of tinged? HTH!

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The shell wasn't green. It looked just like the others in the carton. The eggs aren't even sorted by size. The shells aren't colored at all, not green or brown or blue. Just plain.

The whites were just tinged green. It was the first one I cracked and I thought "Wow, thsoe whites really look green but it must be my eyes." Then I cracked the second egg into the pan and that one was clear (or whitish). So it was green enough that I could tell without needing the second egg in the pan.

I'm going to ask the farmer next week what they think when I go to my local farmers market to pick up more items. Maybe it was some strange worm or grub that chicken ate!

[judiu]

Maybe a high level of copper in the egg? When you heat copper, you get a blue/green color...?

[Adam Balic]

Did the farmer look like this?

Your eggs are likely to have high amounts of riboflavin (vitamin B2), which gives a yellow/green tint to the whites sometimes.

[Carole]

Judiu, the whites were green before they were heated so I don't think it was iron.

Adam, thanks! High B2 amounts sounds like a good thing. (the link you had in your

message didn't work)

[Temple]

Since your eggs are from free-range chickens its likely due to foraging habits and diet of the chicken. As already mentioned, riboflavin/B2 is the main cause, the chicken likely had a diet of chlorophyll-rich plants. Conceptually similar to flamingo's characteristic pink coloring being caused by the beta-carotene from the brine shrimp they eat.

[freshherbs]

seuss. definitely seuss.

[CalumC]

Just flicked through McGee, there was nothing about green white. The copper theory above seems plausible.

[tino27]

seuss.  definitely seuss.

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Or Irish.