The Top 6 Historical Egg Preservation Techniques!

My grand-mother told me that, during WWII, they preserved eggs in slaked lime and it worked well. At the time finding food was very difficult , so these eggs were like a treasure to her family. I write from Florence, Italy.

2015: This might be great for a historical presentation 2021: You might need to do this to continue to eat

In a deleted scene, John actually buried eggs in nutmeg.

I simply dip my eggs in boiling water for approx. 3-5 seconds. This seals the shell . I then place it back in the egg container and find a shaded area to keep them. I am a world traveler aboard my sailboat and this method of preservation has worked out well for me. The eggs still taste great even after 2 months. Thought some off your subscribers might be interested. Thanks for a interesting video. Vince Roberts

8/22/18 So two years ago I set up my bucket and stocked it. Last weekend I unpacked it. All the eggs were viable but had cracks where they touched which was filled by lime. The shells were thinning and the insides were more runny than new eggs but about the same as at 6 months. I boiled them up and tested them against 2 week old eggs and they were a bit salty and had a slight pickling lime flavor but all of them were edible. The boiled product was actually smoother and creamier than new eggs. So no rotten eggs after two years is a pretty good amount of time. Definitely useful for overwintering eggs or short term non-refridgerated eggs storage in a cool location. Not tested for warm or tropical environs.

In April of 2015, my chickens started laying eggs again after "winter break". In July, I had a glut of eggs and couldn't give them away fast enough. One day the thought came to mind of how, before refrigeration, chicken eggs were stored during the winter when hens generally stop laying. That's when I came across this video. After viewing a couple of times, and later finding some university test cases from the early 1900's, I decided to give the hydrated lime and water method a go. In August of 2015, I packed 4 dozen eggs into a large glass container and simply poured a solution of waterproof and pickling lime over the eggs and set them aside. I used approximately a 30 ppm mixture. I placed the container on my kitchen counter so I could easily keep an eye on conditions. Over the winter, I would cook a couple of eggs from the container every few days. The other days I would eat store bought eggs. I couldn't tell the difference, and neither could anyone else. BTW, no one unknowingly ate stored eggs... today is June 18th, and I ate the last 2 eggs just a few days ago. They were just as tasty and cooked the same as store bought eggs 10 months later. 48 eggs stored, eaten over the course of 8 months, perfectly preserved, 100% success rate! Pretty amazing!!! This year, I'll store 2 gross, 288 eggs in 6 separate containers. Thanks Jon for originally presenting this info in a most interesting and informative way. Had I not seen your video, I probably wouldn't have tried this.

I went on a three month voyage and had read about Napoleons crew preserving eggs by painting them with melted beeswax. I painted 12 dozen eggs for the trip and they did great— we didn’t have any break nor did they spoil.

Years ago in the late 70's and early 80's I was an ocean sailor sailing around the world , and preserving food with very little refrigeration was always a challenge . The system we used for eggs was to coat them , but with none of the methods mentioned here . We used bee's wax . It worked fantastic for many months and did not impart any flavors or anything .Bee's wax has natural anti-microbial properties .We had several techniques for other things also .We could triple or more the lifespan of leafy greens and celery type foods by storing them with the stem parts wrapped in cloth and kept wet (the stems not the whole plant) . This would essentially keep them growing for weeks .

For those interested. I started a lime bucket and stocked it with eggs one year ago. Last week I opened two more eggs (see other long discussion for other egg openings) and found that the shells were slightly harder but they did not float and did not lose any liquid. However, the yolk was beginning to dry out and the gelatin of the egg contents was breaking down but not contamination. So honestly, I wouldn't keep them longer than 9 months for a really useful egg but in case of real emergency, I haven't seen them go rotten yet! Pretty amazing!

My limed eggs (I thought this was called waterglassing) are a full year old. The only degradation I have noticed is that the yolks have become quite fragile. This is fine if they will be beaten, such as for baking or scrambled eggs or omelets, but I wouldn't try to separate them for meringue or the like. The flavor is just fine, too. I would advise not to fill a 5-gallon bucket, like I did. The weight of the eggs (although buoyed by the solution) did break one way down at the bottom. That was "pleasant" to eventually reach, after smelling the promise of it for 3/4 of the bucket. All the other eggs in the bucket (that hadn't cracked - though none others fully broke) were perfectly edible. So this year I am using one-gallon glass jars instead. Then there isn't so much weight on the ones on the bottom, and I can see in there, too. This is my new go-to method.

My grandma (93) was from rural Ohio in a house w no electricity or running water and told me about having to get eggs out of the basement and hated having to reach into the lime water barrel to get the eggs. Always bring told to reach down to the bottom and hated getting her arm wet all the way up. Now here I am seeing it in use. Amazing .

The price of tuna has more than doubled. I'm a senior on a very limited budget. I've learned to dehydrate and can, taking advantage of sales. I'm no longer able to garden like I used to, so I garden in 5 gal buckets on my big porch. For those who are not able to garden, perhaps like they used to, that's an option. I also fish from docks and off the bank. I'm saving for a small chest freezer. If the day comes and there may not be electricity, I'll have food storage.

Just an interesting sidenote. Here in germany it is not allowed to wash eggs before selling them to the consumer and it is also not allowed to import previously washed eggs from other countries. It is also advised to not wash eggs yourself. That is indeed the reason why eggs are quite long durable here (maybe 3-4 weeks) and you do not have to cool eggs for the first 1-2 weeks. If you buy eggs here it is said on the package something like: Date of expiry: XX.XX.XXXX Advised to cool from: XX.XX.XXXX

Interestingly, in the UK it's illegal for farmers to wash eggs for this specific reason. British eggs don't need to be refrigerated to stay fresh because the natural antibacterial coating that eggs have stays intact. It also means that condensation doesn't form on the outside of an egg once you remove it from the fridge in the supermarket, which can cause serious problems for bacterial growth inside the egg if the buyer doesn't dry the eggs before storing them. The trade-off is that in the UK you need to wash your hands after handling eggs in the kitchen.

This channel is so wholesome. Just a happy dude sharing historical recipes. What’s not to love

I'm getting ready to preserve eggs here using the hydrated lime solution. I might add that eggs should be stored big end up, small or "pointy" end down. The air sac is in the pointy small end, and storing them that end down will keep the air sac from spreading through and drying out the egg.

When civilization crumbles, guys like him will be bees knees!

Read a lot of comments so please note- the more eggs you put in one container, the higher the risk of the simple weight cracking an egg on bottom. Our largest egg basket taught us how easy that can happen, which is why, even tho liquid greatly reduces weight, I will not store any lime-eggs in a container larger than 1 gallon size, and most of my containers are about half that size. The old saying of never put all your eggs in one basket is very true for more than one reason. Cookie jars, new and from Goodwill, are excellent for lime egg storage.

I found an ancient Chinese preserved egg recipe (a missionary wrote it down) that included slaked lime, wood ash, salt, and clay. It is an alkaline preservation. Interesting that they had the components here separately.

I did the slaked lime with my chicken's eggs. After 9 months they taste like eggs. Yokes aren't as stiff as fresh, but they're fine scrambled or for baking.