Preserving Eggs with Hydrated Lime

Eight years into raising ducks and chickens and I am done buying eggs from the grocery store during winter. It's such a ridiculous and unsustainable thing to do, I'm embarrassed to even admit to doing it. I would just go without, but the holiday baking! (last 4 years I've frozen eggs but I'd like to get away from that) My husband adores his daily eggs and I love them too but how silly to refuse to use artificial lighting myself and then accept some stranger doing it and PAYING them to do so as I continue to buy feed and care for my flock all winter, letting my gals rest but not the poor factory hens ( I buy cage free organic, but still..). We have a decent sized flock; 23 hens and 6 ducks currently (which fluctuates of course) and I've been selling excess in the spring, then buying eggs in winter. Crazy I know!
When we first got birds, the gal I got the ducks from told me she had tried waterglassing the eggs and "it doesn't work". Why oh why did that one comment stick with me all these years and I just accepted that storing eggs doesn't work. Wouldn't I consider that maybe she had done something wrong? Anyhoo, I'm fed up enough about the egg situation to try preserving and see what happens. I read up about using hydrated lime, watched some videos where they show the process and then 8 months later, the grand positive results (it's on YouTube, so must be true, ha).
I started a couple of months ago (and boy, are my regular customers kinda disgruntled about me not selling. People are weird.) and have quite the stash.
Anyone else doing this? The lime looks to have settled to the bottom, I'm hoping the liquid still has enough lime in it to preserve? What's your experience?

I agree!   I hate that I bought summer squash yesterday because I got mine in too late - shame shame, haha!   I've no experience but saw the homesteading family video and am just now getting my egg volume up enough to try it.  So I'll compare notes with you as we progress :)   There is no way I have the patience to wait 8 months to taste the results so I think I'm going to layer the eggs with the oldest always on top so I can sample one each week as they age.   Maybe put the first two dozen in a mesh bag and slide new  ones under it and rob samples from the bag.

[quote=Susan Pruitt]I agree!   I hate that I bought summer squash yesterday because I got mine in too late - shame shame, haha!  [/quote]

Right there with you. Oh well, it'll be abundant soon! :)

Aug. 12, 2018:   Well I'm just now starting to save eggs.   It took me a while to acquire the lime and I only have 5 layers right now, one went broody and the other is getting old, and I use 3-6 every day for myself,  so pickin's have been slim.    I'll start taste testing in a month :)

I'm suspicious of lime at building supply stores - who knows how it's processed or additives for strength, whatever.    So I spent the extra bucks on Mrs. Wages pickling lime (Amazon) since my volume is small anyway.    

The recipe I'm following is  1 oz. Lime (dry weight) per 1 quart filtered water.   Storing in a glass jug in a dark pantry in the house.

UPDATE NOV 4, 2018:   First taste test at about 12 weeks - looks, smells, and tastes exactly like fresh - excellent!

Do you have a root cellar, basement, or other cool location?  We haven't formally tested / tracked it, but our (fresh, unwashed) chicken eggs keep for months in our root cellar when it's cold.  We build up a supply in the fall, and they get us through winter without going bad.  Mother Earth News did some tests on keeping chicken eggs that you might find quite interesting:

https://www.motherearthnews.com/real-food/how-to-store-fresh-eggs-zmaz77ndzgoe

I love this Youtube channel "The Townsends" who share 18th century methods of cooking and preserving foods

We've been eating last summer's eggs all winter and they are delicious. The whites spread out and the yolks are definitely flatter but they are fine. I have them stored in the lime water in plastic buckets and tubs in the crawl space under our house. This morning's are from 5/28/18 so stored over 9 months, not bad.
Just for reference,  a 6 quart container fit 43 eggs (only one duck egg in there) with the water sufficiently covering them.

Jess Dee wrote:Do you have a root cellar, basement, or other cool location?  We haven't formally tested / tracked it, but our (fresh, unwashed) chicken eggs keep for months in our root cellar when it's cold.  We build up a supply in the fall, and they get us through winter without going bad.  Mother Earth News did some tests on keeping chicken eggs that you might find quite interesting:

https://www.motherearthnews.com/real-food/how-to-store-fresh-eggs-zmaz77ndzgoe

That was a good article, thanks! I did wonder how much the temperature of my storage area might be influencing the preservation powers of the lime water on my eggs, since our crawl space is pretty cold. It was 26 outside when I last opened the access door and I could tell it was quite cold down there and the eggs felt refrigerated (which was the point of storing them there of course). However, they sat there all summer and we do see some triple digits once in awhile, definitely upper 90s quite a bit, so there's that.
I'm thinking this year I'll do the lime water thing again all summer but fall's eggs would probably be fine down there for a couple months with nothing done to them.
I'm consistently amazed at people's ignorance of how to tell if eggs are good or bad and how they worry they'll be bad past their expiration date "even if they look good".
For pity's sake, if an egg is bad, you will know it!

Sally Munoz wrote:
For pity's sake, if an egg is bad, you will know it!

Indeed!

I'm thinking of trying an experiment of my own this summer - I may put a few dozen marked eggs in the root cellar, and see how long they last.  I may repeat the experiment in the fall, and see how they last through the colder months.  The trick will be remembering to start the experiment - we get so distracted during planting and harvest!

Jess Dee wrote:

Sally Munoz wrote:
For pity's sake, if an egg is bad, you will know it!

Indeed!

I'm thinking of trying an experiment of my own this summer - I may put a few dozen marked eggs in the root cellar, and see how long they last.  I may repeat the experiment in the fall, and see how they last through the colder months.  The trick will be remembering to start the experiment - we get so distracted during planting and harvest!

Great idea! I don't refrigerate my eggs and when there are a lot,  they can sit out quite awhile. The only ones I've had go real bad probably had tiny cracks in them,  usually they're just more runny. I appreciate you sharing your experiences here! :)

I tried this method in the spring when we were facing the Tsunami Of Eggs. I didn't count but I think I put up over 300. Only a couple of iffy ones and one truly rotten one in the whole bunch. Needless to say, we're sold on the method.

They sat in the garage by the chest freezers, ambient temps maybe up to 20C in the warmest part of summer.

Here's one from early November, cracked last week:

I started eggs in lime water a few months ago.  I'm looking forward to doing more (waiting for buckets to arrive).  My question is, when you empty a bucket, do you start over in the same lime water?  Or do you throw it out (where?  how does it affect the soil?) and start over with fresh lime?

Bonnie

Bonnie, we had an egg break in one of the buckets, so I tipped that water without any misgivings. The other one is probably reusable, but honestly hydrated lime is pretty cheap for us and since we have acidic soils I tend to pitch it on garden beds and make fresh mixtures.

I attempted the lime solution for egg storage a couple of years ago.  For me, it didn't turn out well.

If I have 1 egg crack/break in the top of my storage container has it ruined the entire batch of preserved eggs? Or do I just remove the bad one and move the others to a new bucket with a clean mixture?

I had one crack quite far down in a bucket, and didn't discover it until we had eaten all the eggs above it. They were all fine.

These eggs have been stored in lime water for about 10 months. From the last batch of 6 I took out none had the yolk hold, all of them broke. The eggs were fine otherwise. Any thoughts?

Hi Nidia, and welcome to Permies!

I've never kept eggs that long. Eight months was probably the oldest, but most of the yolks in those were still intact. The thing I notice as they get older is the white gets runnier, so I certainly wouldn't be surprised if the yolks lose their strength at a similar rate.

I'm doing an extra step this year: As I filled one bucket, I moved the eggs into another one so that the oldest ones are now on top. Our birds will stop laying around March, and at that point the oldest eggs will be six months.

Nidia, welcome to Permies! The longest I've kept limed eggs has been about four months. From what I recall, five months is usually considered the limit for storage. Like Phil, I found that the older they got, the runnier the whites got. But I've never had any where the yolks broke. Like the whites, there is likely some loss of integrity of the cell walls. Your experience is interesting though, thanks for sharing.

Nidia again. I’m getting all those runny eggs out today. My goal is to check condition and freeze those that look good. We had no eggs while the hens molted in late October. It took about 2 months for the process to end. By middle December they started laying again, and in good numbers. These hens (Icelandics) have a mind of their own! We are in NW Oregon.

I like seeing this done.  I put 10 dozen in Hydrated Lime this year.  I did a study about 15 years ago and put 3 dozen in card board egg containers.  I put all points down in the containers and stuck them in the fridge.  I ate them every 2 weeks for 6 months and never had a bad one.  Of corse my family would not eat them and thought I was nuts.  

One of the thing I notice with lime is they still prefer to be out of the light and relatively cool.  I keep them in the basement in a bucket on the cement floor that is about 60 deg f.  I use a sealed lit on the bucket.

... just using up the last eggs (18 mo. old) - kept in 2 and 1/2 gallon plastic buckets of limed water (50 lb bag at menards) - kinda runny of course but they scramble up just fine!         - 75 eggs per bucket.

.... crack them one at a time into a dish first to check; maybe one or two bad ones so far out of 7 buckets' worth

In spite of some trouble last year, I’m starting the lime again this year. The troubles last year were the result of mismanagement and I’d say we’ve learned our lesson. I will be using several smaller containers instead of a single large bucket, so the oldest can be used first without having to dig all the way down into the treasure chest. Too many jewels get knocked about in the process!

Have any of you tried washing the eggs then coating them in oil before the lime wash? I get more dirty eggs then clean and want to preserve as many as I can.

I have a batch of 3 dozen from two months ago and noticed the water at the bottom has gone cloudy. I assume cracked egg. Is the batch a waste now? Move them to a clean jar? Don't worry as the other eggs should be sealed up and the lime kills the bacteria?

... the lime may just be settling out; may be a good idea to fish them out and check for cracks etc so as to not find problems later    
.... the ratio used here is 4oz lime per gallon of water - so there is a considerable layer of lime at the bottom.
... muddy chickie feet here as well- lots of rain.... annoying to only have 1 or 2 clean eggs per dozen for the lime bucket! - one person can't eat up all the rest.... ideas anyone? - no way to lock the girls up; they feed themselves by free ranging... little chickie boots? - chickie foot mat at the nest box? - am unwilling to wash the bloom off the eggs going into the bucket; but need a solution...

I have found that the lime settles out to the bottom of the bucket. Do you restir it each day?

Hi Kathy,

Welcome to Permies.

Where did you all find hydrated lime & what brand if you aren't going with the super expensive pickling lime?

Hi Tracie, welcome to permies.  I buy ours at the local feed mill in 40-50 pound bags.  As far as I know it just needs to be hydrated lime.  It works well for us.

Edit:  I can't find the bag.  I put it in sealable buckets so it does not absorb water.