I mean, I pay more for eggs. That's it.
Yeah, it isn't like eggs are a massive part of my food costs.
The overall increase in food prices have more impact than one specific ingredient.
I'm becoming an inveg -- involuntary vegan
I didn't realize, but same. Meat, besides chicken, is becoming more and more of a treat. Even then, I get stuff with bones and save them for stock. Not vegan, I know, but definitely much more plant focused than I remember being.
LOL. I came up with inveg back in 2018 after I had to go vegan due to major heart surgery. I use it all the time but you're the first person I have ever seen use the term other than me even though "involuntary veganism" has got to be a thing for plenty of people who've had a near death health issue.
I'm going to start using that, I'm in a similar position.
We eat fewer eggs.
That seems like nothing but eggs are an insanely cheap and fast way to get a decent meal quickly in the morning or to beef up, pun intended, a bowl of grits or oatmeal or something.
When we run out of eggs we don’t just not eat, we may make something that’s less filling or healthy or may spend more on breakfast because there just isn’t time to make breakfast and the only time permissive option is to pay 8-13 dollars for fast food on the way to work or eat peanuts and coke from a gas station.
So the egg price has knock on effects for us that are pretty big.
I’m gonna spend a little time and express something that isn’t being said in the comments:
people’s purchases don’t exist in a vacuum and the meaning of the price of an inexpensive source of protein like eggs nearly doubling in the span of a year or two isn’t just that it costs more.
Often, people shop. That sounds like a stupid thing to say, but the effect of the piggly wiggly implementing barcode scanners is impossible to deny. Shopping is where you go into a store with some goal, like a list, and some budget like the actual cash you have in your possession and try to make those two things match up.
If you’re like me you grew up going on these excursions maybe once a week or more with your parents and understood innately that if you can get something in the cart early, maybe pudding cups or that peanut butter with the chocolate mixed into it, there’s better chance of you enjoying that treat than if you wait till the end.
As adults you probably recognize that it’s because as a person progresses through the store they’re keeping a tally (my grandmother used a literal calculator) of how much of their budget they’ve run through. It’s a toss up weather they’ll be under enough to afford a very cost ineffective piece of candy from the shelf next to the checkout counter so getting that treat in the cart early means the person shopping has the chance to make little adjustments to make up for its price. I never understood the relationship between relatively expensive sugar added peanut butter and the type of green beans we ate that week but that’s one way it manifested. Cut versus French cut was a price difference and we’d eat the cheaper one to make up for some dalliance in the previous isles.
Eggs are in the dairy cooler section. Most stores have these all in one place at first because it was cheaper to run the wiring for them and then because of food safety practices and finally nowadays because everyone expects it. For reasons I’m not sure of, people tend to hit those isles last. It might be to get cold stuff in the cart last so those items don’t warm up in the store as long.
When you’re at the end of your trip to the store, on the last isle, trying to fit the list to your cash, the price of eggs is what determines your choices. If you put back that box of pop tarts you can get two dozen eggs and a loaf of bread. That’s breakfast for a family of four for a week in a pinch. If you swap the stoufers lasagna for a six pack of ramen noodles, a can of beans and some eggs you have a cheaper dinner for four plus some left over.
If you want to have nicer things to eat and can’t afford to buy them but do have plenty of time, eggs are an ingredient that’s hard to replace in baking. There are substitutes but they’re sometimes more expensive and involve being able to learn a new recipe or do some experimenting which just isn’t in the cards for plenty of people. If eggs cost more it means less brownies, cakes, noodles and a bunch of other stuff because suddenly the recipe costs more.
Eggs are the gateway to making your grocery trip work for a lot of people and so when you might not know the price of that can of beans off the top of your head, you absolutely know what eggs cost and make adjustments accordingly. Maybe you buy lower grade eggs like “a” instead of “aa” or you buy more eggs and less meat.
The price of eggs is the backstop to being poor and healthy while maintaining whatever position on the 5d chessboard of equipment, time, money, calories and experience that you occupy or want to be in.
A lot of the posts and comments I’ve seen that specifically reference eggs have a sneering tone or are either denying the price changes or downplaying their effect. I personally think that expressing such sentiments makes you at best inexperienced and ignorant and at worst a bad person, but opinion aside, those kinds of sentiments aren’t helping anyone to understand who you are unless you just want to be seen as an out of touch elite.
To go a little further, the price of eggs is an undeniable metric that shows wages haven’t risen with inflation+cpi+externalities. It means there’s a problem in a way that can’t be denied or misdirected from.
If eggs were 50-100% more expensive and wages had risen across the board by that same 50-100% then no one would be complaining except old timers in the rocking chairs in front of the gas station.
That’s not what’s happening and now the things that let poor people keep living and not quite poor people buy all their groceries are 50-100% more expensive. If that isn’t alarming to you it should be.
This is brilliant - one quality rant, for sure.
Egss are a metric, which people are focusing on but they're forgetting whybits a useful metric ('cos it's protein that's cheaper than meat and a useful building block of a lot of foods)
I scramble to make eggs meet
Not at all. The only eggs I get are from a local chicken enclosure where my family helps out by feeding them once a week.
I'm not buying eggs for $17 a dozen. I got a flat for $33 that breaks down to $7 a dozen, my kids got real excited about it and ate them all in about a week and a half. They are teens so, they tend to eat everything in the fridge pretty quickly. Anyway. I'm thinking maybe I never buy eggs again. maybe I'll buy a chicken.
Where do you live that eggs are $17 a dozen???
The worst possible place to live ever! Ridgecrest, CA! Our sales tax is the highest in three counties, out cost of living matches the trendiest neighborhoods in LA and NYC! We have a military base that's all engineers, and we're an half hour from Death Valley! We get the hottest recorded tempatures on record every summer! We're one of the most earthquake prone locations in the world, we live in the rain shadow of the Sierra Nevadas, and off base average income is worst then any other rural location! Our school bus drives are paid less than half of every single school district in the nation! And everyone's a racist piece of shit republican! Yee haw! . Well, I am from here, and I do actual like most things about living here, but it's not going to work out much longer. Seriously our fast food locations upped their prices so high with greedflation that no one is bothering anymore. They put up ''now accepting EBT" that's food stamps, at all of them to try and get people back. It's crazy. There's an adittude in town of ''you all work at the base making 6 figures you can pay double for everything! Plus it costs at least $60 in gas to drive out of town to do anything, so if you want it done in town we're charging $60 extra because fuck you'' and that's always been the case, nothing new, but add inflation and stagnant wages, it's pretty fucking crazy.
The cumulative price increases are noticeable. Grocery receipts feel like they are $25-50 more expensive for the same stuff.
We buy a dozen eggs every other week, so that specifically isn't impacting us much, but in the store I usually take note, and say damn under my breath when I see the $7+ ones.
It is impacting my life a lot. It affect my meal plan, the balance of my meals, my overall food budget, my snaking possibilities. It also ruined my mood whenever a see how quickly the money I spend on eggs adds up to the cost of owning a hen!
Also eggs retail have consentrate most of today retail malpractice.I'm not from the USA btw.
It's made me a lot more smug about having our own quail.
... how many quail eggs are needed to make a decent sized omelet anyway? A dozen?
Half dozen is plenty really. In recipe's it's supposed to be 3 quail eggs to replace 1 chicken egg, it's really about 2.5 just rounded up. With a family of four and a dozen birds we have egg breakfasts 2 or 3 times a week in the summer, down to every other week in the winter. We'll probably expand the flock a little this summer, bigger cage plans once I can figure out how to keep them as safe as they are in the shed now. Just found out rodents can spread bird flu too, so building requirements just got tougher.
Checkmate I'm vegan so I don't have to worry about that. My spouse used to work in a winery that had a chicken coop and bring home many boxes of eggs for free before I went vegan, and you could keep them on the counter. Room temperature fresh eggs beat grocery store eggs by a million years for cooking with, go to a farm and buy a few boxes, they keep a very long time, and learn how to make Frank Prisinzano's crispy egg recipe.
Does my country being destroyed because of other dipshits freaking out about them count as impacting my life?
I had to give up animal products and soy. At this point, I'd pay the $10/dozen if I could eat one without being sick. 😉
Hasn't affected my life one bit. It people weren't mentioning egg prices on Lemmy, I would have had no idea that there was a shortage.
Never understood everyone's obsession with eggs. There are so many other sources of protein out there. You don't need to perpetually have them in your fridge.
Because normally eggs are very cheap, very easy, and very healthy. When you're broke and living off pasta, beans, and rice, eggs are something you make that you feel good about feeding yourself and your family. Anybody can make good scrambled eggs, and those two eggs in the morning can get you through until you get back home after work.
I can't explain everyone's obsession, but mine is easy to explain: I want to feed my baby two eggs most days of the week. They're clean, she enjoys them plain, they're easy for her to chew, they're very quick, and there's no question on whether they cooked long enough. I hate the taste of eggs but I ate them non-stop through my pregnancy and now as I breast feed. You can't beat them for efficiency. Some days those two eggs are all I eat until dinner time.
They're also crazy versatile! Scrambled, eggs-in-a-basket, hard boiled, French toast, over easy, runny on toast with a tomato slice, egg salad.
People don't need them, they like them.
I haven't looked at egg prices in over five years. Are they getting more expensive?
I hope they get so expensive that no one buys them anymore.
A little more expensive, no biggie.
Not eggs specifically but the price of food is out of hand.
The price of eggs in particular I haven't noticed. I have been vegan for ten years, so I am over here trying to give people tips on how and where to replace eggs with other, cheaper stuff. I do anlot of baking and cooking, so I have tried all the swaps the internet recommended and have a pretty good idea which ones work.
However, the price of food as a whole is going up as well, and I don't expect it to stop anytime soon. I am hoping to set up a 'victory garden' to try to help. If anyone else is looking into this, I recommend looking for an official victory garden guide that would have been issued for your particular area. I found one that was written by an agricultural professor at the University of Ithaca in NY, for example, and it goes over what crops and food preservation methods will work in my area. It will give you important information about temp tolerances, which is about to be more important than ever.
I've moved on to tofu scramble. Not as good but cheap as still pretty tasty.
Wonder how is tofu shakshuka?
I just wing it honestly. I use firm/extra firm tofu and press it (put paper towels on both sides of the tofu and something heavy on top like a bowl of water and leave it for 15 minutes or so). The just fry it in maybe a tablespoon of oil with some seasoning. A little turmeric gives it a nice color and flavor.
Hash browns, onions and bell peppers go a long ways too if you have them around.
Got a recipe?
I'm part of a CSA with a small, local farm. The winter share was $5 a dozen for 2 dozen every other week. We'll see if the price goes up for the summer share.
Maybe I'm lucky to be in a city with tons of farms nearby, but I'd encourage others to look for local options like this.
I have not bought any eggs in about a year or so. The price of food keeps increasing and this is one of the more egregious examples. Sure there's the bird flu outbreak, but I wouldn't be surprised if prices are being increased far beyond the actual cost.
USD$4.50 for 30 large eggs.
for context, i live in hong kong.
Like all rising living expenses, it is crushing me. Not that you really care, you want EZ points to style on the republicans.
These gotchyas, slams, and owns do not make my rent lower or raise my wages.
No I posted this because I hear a lot of complaints but I'm a vegetarian and allergic to eggs. Don't make assumptions that are not there.
My cholesterol is super high, so it's been an excuse to drop them from my diet for a couple months.
Was this article about you?
I have less money and customers are meaner, I guess? That's how literally every new development affects every working class person
There have been zero eggs for a week now at my grocery store because of the bird flu soooo
Not at all, I don't eat eggs regularly
there were no eggs. i ran to walfart last night. none. zero. im sure kroger might have some
They are delicious, and super cheap. And turns out there's even subscriptions for them. We bought 72 a couple days back for 15 euros at a local farm.
Eggs are awesome, they're making my breakfast and lunch easier and better
It’s reminding me that most people don’t see the forest for the trees.
more worried about future prices given the culling that actually made chicken meat cheaper recently.
There are no eggs. Anywhere.
Eating a few less, but I'm lucky to have my father-in-law who raises chickens nearby. His girls are laying prodigiously right now, and I've not had to buy eggs in months as long as I pay attention.
The shelves at my local stores are nearly empty however. I used to buy the expensive grain-free ones anyway. Because good eggs vs not are like comparing fresh vegetables to canned ones - you know they are related, but distantly.
The Rotisserie chicken I just bought was cheaper than a dozen eggs. This raises a bunch of questions in my mind, and, to answer my first question - yes, cooking the chicken does prevent the spread of bird flu...
It doesn't?
I don't buy eggs, so not directly.
I've had to buy a few eggs since my chickens stopped laying for the winter but hopefully in a month or two I won't have to buy.
Like eggs, but I can live without.
WE EAT EGGS
It has certainly been annoying, the shortage perhaps more than the price.
My wife and I were keto before the pandemic. Years of struggling just to be less overweight, and all of a sudden with keto we just dropped pounds easily. She has epilepsy too, so animal protein is a key piece of her nutrition. We were actually able to continue through the pandemic at first, but eventually a combination of outbreaks at meat packing plants, the bird flu, and of course the collusion of the major agricultural corporations, meant that we stopped because it was just too expensive. Even our protein powder went from ~$30 for a 10lb package to now $85 for a 3.4lb package.
So we stopped and gained weight. I tried to get us to start again later, but my wife had a hard time sticking to it and kept on buying more bread and rice. We finally managed to make the switch in December. I entered ketosis, started dropping weight, and was really the best I felt in years... Then we got influenza type A. I tried to stay keto through it but eventually had to stop (could not find any keto cough drops).
Okay so that's all done and finally we can get back on keto. Go to buy some chicken and eggs and.... Out of stock everywhere. And since then when it is in stock it's even more expensive than before.
At this point we've already seen the mega food corporations get slaps on the wrist for colluding on reducing supplies and hiking prices for profit- we usually find out a few years after the fact and the news usually gets buried. If only there were a way to truly hold the CEO's and board members of those companies accountable.
Outta curiosity what is a Keto cough drop?
I mean I don't think there are any high protein cough drops, but I'm pretty sure you can get sugar free cough drops... You can atleast definitely get sugar free boiled sweets, a couple of type 1 diabetics I know have them, and you get them at the checkouts here as shops aren't allowed to put sugary snacks at the checkouts.
And in regards to getting proteins that are atleast in stock, lentils and peas/beans are pretty good sources of proteins, I've seen people make some good looking keto friendly naan breads/flat breads using pea protein (IIRC), have you tried anything like that?
I've seen some that claim to be low sugar, but still have a lot of carbs. For a keto diet. Protein content would not be relevant, moreso the lack of carbs.
I have not checked recently, but the last time I was keto pea protein was a very expensive option. I forgot to mention in my first comment but I have found a more reasonably priced brand of low-carb whey protein.
Also I've found that I generally don't like substitutions. Trying to find a food that is similar to bread or rice really just makes me want bread or rice more. The most successful part of dieting for me is to change my mentality from "living to eat" to "eating to live" anyways. So ideally I would like eggs for breakfast (tons of different ways to prepare them), chicken breast and vegetables for lunch (tons of options here too as long as you avoid high-carb sauces or vegetables), and a protein smoothie for dinner (low-sugar Orange Juice, vanilla protein powder, peanut butter, and ice).
I have successfully started again, but I've had to use pork and beef instead of chicken. Which is less healthy and more expensive. Fish is also an option, though not being near a coast makes that expensive too. I'm fortunate enough to be able to afford an increased grocery bill without too much hardship, but it's a conscious choice to cut back on saving up for big things like our next car or home improvement projects.
If you can't do full keto, skip rice and use lentils. They have a lot of fibre and protein. They will make you feel full the next day also due to fiber. Some are 20% protein but the ones I can get locally are 30% protein. For us the brown ones are a substitute for dishes that want ground beef. Like a meatloaf, or chilli. The red ones break down nicely in a thickened soups and stews.
You can get lentil flour from Indian stores, for trying out recipes that ask for wheat flour. Takes some adjusting.
They more or less cost the same as before.
But I'm also not from the US
I have a pregnant wife who eats eggs every morning and it sucks. That and a ton of foods being prepped with eggs at some point makes the rest of food go up in price as well, I’d assume.
In Europe tho price off eggs are still stable. Even if they rise I live rural so I know some local egg producers so I'll always have access to cheap eggs.
I eat fewer eggs
I stock up when I see them at a reasonable price. They'll last a few weeks.
They should last for at least 6 weeks in the fridge!
"Last". Yes. In practice, I found eggs in a fridge age by weeks. I would still call them "fresh" within a week. After that, they don't taste as well. Another week after that, visual changes happen on the shell. I can see as if the fluid inside is "breaching" the membrane thus dark spots on the outside. This is the last stage I would still be willing to consume them. After that I would throw them away.
I barely use eggs, maybe one or two every once in a while to make something but in the morning I'm in a hurry so it's breakfast shakes for me!
Half the time I go to the store there aren’t any eggs. The highest ones are 10$ a dozen. The reg ones are $5 a dozen. But again that’s when they’re available in the first place.
Nothing. My local area has a lot of chicken in peoples back yards.
I can't get the cheapest eggs near me which is disappointing
Not at all. I don't eat eggs. Never knew the prices went up (beyond just general inflation) till I saw this post.
Locally they've gone up to 50cts an egg, because most chicks died in last month's cyclone.
A little bit yeah. Really just all food is a lot more expensive.
I used to not have to check my bank account. Now my savings account is slowly shrinking. And it's almost entirely because of the cost of food.
Inflation sent me from adding to savings each month to pulling from it instead. Just hope my wife or I get a decent promotion before the savings run out I guess.
Not at all. Eggs were never a significant experience to begin with.
I really like eggs, but I walk to my grocery store and back, and often bump the fuck outta whatever I buy. After the first accident, I've not bought eggs in a real long while.
I think buying Eggs is Illegal. (Bad Trans Egg joke)
Ive always spent a bit extra for a certain brand of eggs, which I prefer, so I haven't noticed a great deal of difference if I'm honest.
Can't be skimping on good egg.
