I've noticed when I've bought Italian eggs from delis here in Europe that the yolks are very yellow - almost orange. Why is this? Assume it's the hen's diet. What are they feeding chickens there?
asked Jul 17, 2010 at 23:55
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Whenever I travel to Germany I've been stunned at how yellow/orange the egg yolks are.– JayCommented Oct 1, 2010 at 3:52
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6Compared to British eggs? American eggs? Canadian eggs?– hippietrailCommented Jul 26, 2011 at 8:30
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7 Answers
Alternatively, the chickens may have been fed maize (corn); they market a specific maize-fed brand over here and the yokes of those eggs are a very deep yellow as well.
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Sounds plausible. I'm going to mark it the official answer. Commented Jul 18, 2010 at 12:31
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Yes. we give corn to chicken, although I never knew it was just Italians doing it. Commented Sep 29, 2010 at 18:33
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3The yellow colour comes mostly from Carotenoids which are in common chicken foods such as grass, Corn, and Alfalfa (pea family). It can also come from worms and insects etc– TFDCommented May 22, 2011 at 22:58
The yellow color comes (primarily) from vitamin A in the eggs. The eggs are high in vitamin A when the chickens are fed a natural diet of seeds, vegitation and insects.
Most of the eggs that you buy in the states are factory farmed and pale because the chickens are fed a special protein mix that has a lot of corn. This makes them lay faster and more economicly, but the mix is somewhat nutrient poor, so the eggs are less colorful. This also used to happen in cows: the milk was yellow in the summer when they ate grass, but white in the winter when they ate hay and grains.
If you find good yellow eggs, that is a good sign that the chickens led a good life on a natural diet. Of course, the feed could just be doped with vitamin A to make the eggs look more yellow.
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4Interesting and I think this is the factor. But if you buy UK organic eggs they're not quite as yellow as this. See evidence below (fourth pic down)... londoneater.com/2009/07/22/… So leading on from the answer, what is so high in vitamin A in the Italian chicken's diet? Commented Jul 18, 2010 at 12:11
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3Organic doesn't necessarily mean free range. I suspect something is added to the feed, but I haven't seen how Italian chickens are raised, so I'm forced to speculate. Commented Jul 18, 2010 at 15:53
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I think you are meaning Carotenoids (which can be converted into Retinal aka vit A)? Carotenoids are sourced from all sorts of foods. The colour of the carotenoids gives the colour of the yolk. You can have red or blue yolks if you want!– TFDCommented May 22, 2011 at 22:52
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1You can't feed direct vit. A to any animal without major risk of killing it– TFDCommented May 22, 2011 at 23:01
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4The yellow color doesn't come from the vitamin A (and not from the beta carotene, which is actually contained in the yolk). It comes from different compounds called xanthophylls (source: Harold McGee on food and cooking).– rumtscho ♦Commented Sep 24, 2011 at 20:59
Farmers can control the colour of the yolk by controlling the chickens' diet. Some farms add colour to the chicken feed to produce different coloured yolks.
answered Sep 29, 2010 at 20:04
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2+1 for linking to what I think is the likely answer -- marigolds. (US chickens get plenty of corn, although, it's possible that it's not all yellow corn)– JoeCommented Sep 30, 2010 at 17:21
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1This is simple and effectively correct. How farmers do it is not so simple. It can takes weeks for the colour changes to happen, and to have long lasting colour can take specific food mixes. It is mostly marketing though as the colour often has very little to do with the nutritional profile of the egg– TFDCommented May 22, 2011 at 23:08
Don't know about Italian chickens in particular, but I know that when my mom's neighbors in Hungary feed their chickens the leftovers from making paprika, the resulting eggs have very dark yolks indeed.
One of the most unique uses for oleoresin paprika is that it is added to poultry feed in order to give the yolks in chicken eggs a darker yellow appearance than is natural for them. Due to the fact that is is derived from natural food sources as a food colorant, in the United States, it is exempt from Food and Drug Administration (FDA) certification. It receives equally lenient treatment under European law, where it is grouped with similar colorants of capsanthin and capsorubin.
Quoting from the KCRW Good-food podcast, episode Italy comes to LA, cauliflower, and Kachka of 6 Jan 2018: the hens are feed marigold petals.
This was also true in Spain. I do know that our own backyard hens have this deep orangish color yoke because they have access to the outdoors, greens, and bugs, I think only factory farmed eggs are pale yellow and I wonder if the EU has regulations about factory farming chickens.
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Hello and welcome! As this doesn't attempt to definitively answer the question, it would be better left as a comment, which you will be able to do once you gain some more reputation Commented Sep 19, 2019 at 9:53