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Can I Sell My Hen's Eggs from My Own House?


Rich1972
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[quote user="gardengirl "]I'd love to have a neighbour with free range eggs for sale. In France I plan my boiled eggs with soldiers, cooking quiches etc around Wednesdays, when I can buy very fresh free range eggs in the market. In UK they're usually from Waitrose.[/quote]

If you have terrace you can always buy (or make) a 'micro' chicken house for two and put it on the terrace. They make wonderful pets, fun to watch and quite sociable plus you get fresh eggs every day. We had one on our canal boat up on the roof, sausage, bacon, egg and beans with two slices and a cup of tea, just right to start the day. The French do soldiers I noticed but I don't know, or can't remember, what they call them. We had one French guy who not only cut the bread in to perfect soldiers but also took the crusts off.

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[quote user="gardengirl "]I'd love to have a neighbour with free range eggs for sale. In France I plan my boiled eggs with soldiers, cooking quiches etc around Wednesdays, when I can buy very fresh free range eggs in the market. In UK they're usually from Waitrose.[/quote]

Look very carefully at the coding printed on the eggs that you buy in the market, you might get a shock.

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[quote user="Chancer"]

[quote user="gardengirl "]I'd love to have a neighbour with free range eggs for sale. In France I plan my boiled eggs with soldiers, cooking quiches etc around Wednesdays, when I can buy very fresh free range eggs in the market. In UK they're usually from Waitrose.[/quote]

Look very carefully at the coding printed on the eggs that you buy in the market, you might get a shock.

[/quote]

Quite, a market near me sells farm fresh eggs (ahem) that are, on inspection, clearly coded type 3 [Www]

I always check.

See Clair's post here http://www.completefrance.com/cs/forums/1517498/ShowPost.aspx

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Can you officially sell eggs? No. But you could give them away to people, as we do, and our friends always offer to pay/reimburse us for the cost of the chickens' food. There's not always a financial exchange, sometimes it's favours, or excess produce from their garden, but sometimes there's a bag of corn or wheat.

I suppose you could call this 'barter'.

Does the EEC allow this?
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[quote user="Cat"][quote user="Chancer"]

[quote user="gardengirl "]I'd love to have a neighbour with free range eggs for sale. In France I plan my boiled eggs with soldiers, cooking quiches etc around Wednesdays, when I can buy very fresh free range eggs in the market. In UK they're usually from Waitrose.[/quote]

Look very carefully at the coding printed on the eggs that you buy in the market, you might get a shock.

[/quote]

Quite, a market near me sells farm fresh eggs (ahem) that are, on inspection, clearly coded type 3 [Www]

I always check.

See Clair's post here http://www.completefrance.com/cs/forums/1517498/ShowPost.aspx

[/quote]

What surprises me is the willingless of these people to sell battery eggs as free range but why dont they just change the letter on the padpress? Perhaps they just buy them and sell them on at the markets for a bloomin good mark up and the producer being an easy target for the authorities sticks to the law.

The market inspectors and the patrolling Gendarmes dont seem to care unless of course the seller looks to be of Arab origin and doesnt have the right paperwork and or his carte d'identité and then they are on the case in a very brutal manner.

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The micro chicken house is a lovely idea, Quillan. But as we're there only half the year and 2 floors up in a residence, I don't think it would work for me. I can just imagine the AGM in May! ;o)

On fresh eggs, I just trusted my egg supplier; he's got a bio egg stall at the little Wednesday market and supplies the bio shop in town. I can't say I've ever checked the code, or known what such things mean. We're setting out later this morning to drive down, so I'll check next Wednesday and have another chat with him. I'll report back as to whether feathers fly! ;o)

Singe, did your word 'mouillettes'' mean 'soldiers' for my boiled egg? Thanks.
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GardenGirl.

Rather than asking the Bio supplier, as on the TV reportages they got very aggressive when confronted with a hidden camera customer that knew what the egg coding meant, just check one of the eggs, if the number is 3 then they are battery eggs, there are other codes for free range and bio I think but I dont now what they are.

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[quote user="Bugbear"][quote user="Jay"]Talk about going off topic! The OP simply asked if there were any regulations regarding the sale of eggs and that was answered. The discussion is about a regulated animal food product which a private person wants to sell for personal gain. Suddenly we are talking about a registered charity selling fruit and veg. and how much better it is in the UK than France with it's cute village cottages all selling produce from little tables outside the gate??

May I point out that the regulations regarding eggs are EXACTLY the same in the UK as they are in France or any other EU country. I am not aware of any regulations regarding fruit & veg.

Let me know where the church is and I'll send along the rhubarb inspector.[/quote]

Where is the 'Big Yawn' Smilie when you need it........................[8-)]

She was standing in the kitchen, preparing our usual

Soft-boiled eggs and toast for breakfast, wearing only

The 'T' shirt that she normally slept in.

As I walked in, almost awake, she turned to me and said

Softly," You've got to make love to me this very moment!"

My eyes lit up and I thought, "I am either still dreaming

Or this is going to be my lucky day!"

Not wanting to lose the moment, I embraced her and then

Gave it my all; right there on the kitchen, table.

Afterwards she said, "Thanks," and returned to the stove,

Her T-shirt still around her neck.

Happy, but a little puzzled, I asked, "What was that all about?"

She explained, "The egg timer's broken."

.

[/quote]

Laughing Uncontrollably, I love it! classic, Ive only been here 5 mins but you guys kill me.

Dog, you too, my kind of humor

Im going to enjoy it here ;)
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Welcome Medieval Castle; there are certainly plenty of characters around!

Are you also an insomniac, or do you live in a distant place? We used to have an insomniac's club on the forum, but most people fell asleep!

I'm still waiting for someone who knows what no markings on eggs means; thanks for bumping this up! ;o)

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Hi Gardengirl, Wiki has this to say...

"Le code n’est pas obligatoire quand on achète les œufs directement sur le lieu de production."

For eggs sold on markets, no matter how small the the number of chickens kept or eggs produced, this document from 2006 is the most recent information I can find: http://www.finances.gouv.fr/DGCCRF/04_dossiers/consommation/ficonso/c06.htm

"Vous etes producteur d'oeufs et vous vendez directement votre

production d'oeufs sur les marchés. Cette activité doit etre déclarée a

la Direction des Services Vétérinaires de votre département.

En effet, il est désormais obligatoire de marquer les oeufs commercialisés sur un marché afin d'en assurer la tracabilité."

To summarise: eggs sold on a market (or in a shop) should be stamped. No markings on eggs means that the buyer has no guarantee of where or when they were laid nor how the chickens were kept.

You will know a fresh egg by how well the white holds together when it is broken into a pan; fresh eggs stay fried egg shaped.  It is also obvious whether the chickens have access to grass; chlorophyl makes the yolk much more yellow. The difference in colour is obvious in cooked food. I marvelled on Tuesday at the colour of the pancakes... noticably more yellow than ones I remember as a child. [:)]

Whether you choose to buy unmarked eggs is a question of whether you trust the seller. Perhaps you could ask in the bio shop whether they have visited the producer, or even make a visit yourself.

Hope that helps a bit.  I expect that your marché-purchased eggs are fresh, yellow and deeelish, but it's wise to ask questions about production methods. I'm very cautious about claims of organic production, even when certified there are varying levels of organic-ness... and such claims are almost a licence to print money.

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[quote user="MedievalCastle"][quote user="Bugbear"][quote user="Jay"]Talk about going off topic! The OP simply asked if there were any regulations regarding the sale of eggs and that was answered. The discussion is about a regulated animal food product which a private person wants to sell for personal gain. Suddenly we are talking about a registered charity selling fruit and veg. and how much better it is in the UK than France with it's cute village cottages all selling produce from little tables outside the gate??

May I point out that the regulations regarding eggs are EXACTLY the same in the UK as they are in France or any other EU country. I am not aware of any regulations regarding fruit & veg.

Let me know where the church is and I'll send along the rhubarb inspector.[/quote]

Where is the 'Big Yawn' Smilie when you need it........................[8-)]

She was standing in the kitchen, preparing our usual

Soft-boiled eggs and toast for breakfast, wearing only

The 'T' shirt that she normally slept in.

As I walked in, almost awake, she turned to me and said

Softly," You've got to make love to me this very moment!"

My eyes lit up and I thought, "I am either still dreaming

Or this is going to be my lucky day!"

Not wanting to lose the moment, I embraced her and then

Gave it my all; right there on the kitchen, table.

Afterwards she said, "Thanks," and returned to the stove,

Her T-shirt still around her neck.

Happy, but a little puzzled, I asked, "What was that all about?"

She explained, "The egg timer's broken."

.

[/quote]

Laughing Uncontrollably, I love it! classic, Ive only been here 5 mins but you guys kill me.

Dog, you too, my kind of humor

Im going to enjoy it here ;)[/quote]
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[quote user="Âme"]

To summarise: eggs sold on a market (or in a shop) should be stamped. No markings on eggs means that the buyer has no guarantee of where or when they were laid nor how the chickens were kept.

We seem to have come full circle here from when I was shot down for quoting the regulations!

You will know a fresh egg by how well the white holds together when it is broken into a pan; fresh eggs stay fried egg shaped.  It is also obvious whether the chickens have access to grass; chlorophyl makes the yolk much more yellow. The difference in colour is obvious in cooked food. I marvelled on Tuesday at the colour of the pancakes... noticably more yellow than ones I remember as a child. [:)]

It is much more likely the producer of the eggs picked the colour yolk he wanted from a chart (bit like choice of a paint colour), you can have everything from white to dark yellow and the feed manufacturer doctors the feed for you. I remember one producer in the UK who tried green yolks for a while, they were not a success!

Whether you choose to buy unmarked eggs is a question of whether you trust the seller. Perhaps you could ask in the bio shop whether they have visited the producer, or even make a visit yourself.

Hence the need for regulations!

Hope that helps a bit.  I expect that your marché-purchased eggs are fresh, yellow and deeelish, but it's wise to ask questions about production methods. I'm very cautious about claims of organic production, even when certified there are varying levels of organic-ness... and such claims are almost a licence to print money.

[/quote]
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Âme, that was very kind of you to post that - something I hadn't thought of! The eggs certainly taste very good, definitely hold the whites together well. Locals who've lived here for donkeys years and are green-tinged buy from him, and I know some of them don't throw their sous away! But I never thought to question  the eggs until I read about numbers on them. I'll continue with my enquiries until I've got answers.

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You're very welcome.

The other thing I notice with small-scale production free-range eggs is that they are all different: size, shape, colour and thickness of shell, and the size and position of the yolk is quite variable.

Bonne chance avec l'enquête, Inspector Clous-oeuf!!  [:D]

 

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