Old eggs should always be disposed of responsibly to avoid contamination and food-borne illnesses. You can choose to compost, feed them to animals, recycle them at local centers, or throw them in the trash. Eggs with foul odors or discoloration may be spoiled and should not be eaten.
As long are they are kept refrigerated at 45 °F or lower, fresh shell eggs are safe to be consumed four to five weeks beyond the carton's Julian date (the date eggs were packed).
A shell or two now and then probably won't cause a clog, but Consumer Reports warns that a steady diet of eggshells will eventually lead to buildup and clog your drain. They simply don't break down as well as other foods.
Expired eggs can be used in your garden as a natural fertilizer. To do so, the expert suggests breaking the eggs into small pieces before mixing them with soil. However, you should let the mixture sit for a few days before adding it to your garden.
What happens if you use old eggs. If you use older eggs, the cakes will not rise as well and pavlovas will be flatter than they should be. Generally, the cakes will still work as long as you get some volume from beating, they just won't be as tall or light-as-air as they should be.
Simply fill a bowl with cold tap water and place your eggs in it. If they sink to the bottom and lay flat on one side, they are fresh and good to eat. A bad egg will float because of the large air cell that forms at its base. Any floating eggs should be thrown out.
You can eat eggs past their expiration date. Just be sure to keep your eggs egg-cellent by storing them correctly. If you don't know if an egg is good or not, you can try the float test or give it a whiff. If it doesn't pass the test, throw it away.
The water test for egg freshness
Very fresh eggs will sink to the bottom and lay on their sides. If an egg stays at the bottom but stands on its small end, it's still acceptable to eat; just not quite as fresh.
An egg can float in water when its air cell has enlarged sufficiently to keep it buoyant. This means the egg is old, but it may be perfectly safe to use. Crack the egg into a bowl and examine it for an off-odor or unusable appearance before deciding to use or discard it.
An unwashed egg will last for 6 months or more in the refrigerator. If the fresh eggs have been washed, then the shelf life will be similar to a store bought egg - about 4-5 months.
Here's What Fresh Eggs Daily Tells Us:
And farmers have up to 30 days to go from when the egg is laid to the carton. That means those supermarket eggs can be two months old by the time you buy them.
While it is ideal to eat eggs before this date has passed, they are often still be safe to eat after this date, but its quality may have decreased. For example, you might notice changes in colour, flavour or texture if you choose to eat eggs after the best before date.
Conservative guidelines say that eggs retain their peak quality three to five weeks beyond their sell-by date when kept raw, in their unwashed shells, and stored properly—meaning in a chilled location but not in your refrigerator door.
Fresh eggs can be kept refrigerated for up to 6 weeks but always check the use by date displayed on the carton. It is best to put eggs in the fridge as soon as you get them home.
According to eggs.org.au (best domain name ever), the cartons we see on the shelves of Australian supermarkets contain eggs that were laid up to 42 days ago. That's six weeks. All we have to go by, traditionally, is the 'use-by' date. Or the even more confusing 'best before'.
But, good news, that date isn't a hard and fast rule. “As long as the egg hasn't gone bad, there is no reason you can't still enjoy it,” says nutritionist Keri Gans, RD, author of The Small Change Diet.
Carefully lower your eggs into fresh cold water using a spoon (you can do this in the pan if you're about to boil them). If the eggs stay at the bottom they're fresh; if the eggs float, however, they're stale and best avoided.
A boiling start for 30 seconds to a very gentle simmer for 13 minutes, then an ice bath at the end makes perfect, easy-to-peel hard-boiled eggs.