WTF, Eggs?

Eggs have been having a very strange year. Let’s talk about it.

Eggs, in a fundamental biological sense, are life. They are also having a very strange year. In January, the cost of eggs jumped 15 percent. A month later, eggs experienced their largest price jump since 1980. This surge in prices was, of course, due to the ongoing avian flu epidemic: From December through February alone, almost 54 million chickens were slaughtered after being exposed to the virus. The resulting egg shortages have led restaurant chains like Waffle House and Denny’s to add egg surcharges to their menus, grocery stores to limit the number of eggs customers can buy (assuming there are eggs on the shelves at all), and people to start dyeing potatoes instead of eggs for Easter. But, even before this year, eggs were more than just eggs: they were a symbol of inflation during the presidential election, and some credit egg-flation with helping to usher Trump into a second term.

All of this has led us to take a look at our arguably most ubiquitous and taken for granted breakfast food and ask, well, WTF? We wanted to take a closer look at eggs, the people who farm them, the chickens who produce them, and the various ways that people work around them, whether it’s out of scarcity or dietary preference. Welcome to Egg Week. Join us, won’t you, as we get cracking. — Rebecca Flint Marx