Three Hens, a Bantam Rooster, and Double Yolk Eggs
Some of you know we have some fowl (hah!) stuff going down around here — and now that includes double yolk eggs, which you can read more about below. First, here’s a quick peek into the coop.
In addition to several pulcini (chicks) and chickens (kept separately), we also have three hens (including one bantam) and a bantam rooster who roam around the garden and scare the bejeebers out of the dogs, especially poor Luna.
Three hens that lay one egg a day are plenty for us; once they get into their rhythm, we’ll probably even have extra to give away and/or sell over the summer. The tourists who come to the village love farm fresh eggs, and who can blame them?
The little golden one on the left is a bantam hen and the partner to the bantam rooster; I’m not sure what breed the black hens are.
So, with the warmer temperatures, egg-laying is now kicking into full gear and the girls are really starting to produce. Did you know that sometimes as hens’ cycles are getting regulated, they may do things like lay strange eggs? One of our hens has been doing this:
Laying double yolk eggs may also be a genetic trait. I suppose time will tell with ours, but all I can say is that it’s pretty awesome to whip up a frittata using just three eggs because they each have two “rossi” (as they’re called in Italian) in the middle.
And that’s no yolk!
Hahahahaha…ahem.
What’s your favorite way to enjoy eggs?
If you’re ever stuck for ideas, remember I have an egg section on the recipes page!
30 Beans of Wisdom to “Three Hens, a Bantam Rooster, and Double Yolk Eggs”
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Ahem… the article was going fine until that awful pun…
I dunno…I thought it was punny 😉
I’m desperate for chickens, but The Sock Dropper is protesting that the zoo just can’t get any bigger.
S’not a proper cascina if I can’t have chickens.
I fully support your position Sarah!
When chickens first start laying (eggs!) they lay the: double, triple and extremely large eggs. As they age the eggs get smaller. This is something I remember my Sicilian grandfather telling me many moons ago, so I might be wrong.
Sounds right to me, Gil; we haven’t had triple yolks, but these double yolk ones are rather large. Interestingly, the very first eggs out of all of them were small and super softshell…like squishy even, which I had never seen before. I don’t know if they’re edible but I sure wasn’t going to find out. Ew.
There’s gotta be some Southern Italian superstition in there about the double yolks! TWO EYES looking at you… ha ha ha.
Haha probably! Should I tell P to grab his crotch just in case? 😉
We have a small flock too! 6 grown ladies and 4 new pulcini. My daughter and I just made fresh from the garden spinach salad with hot bacon and maple syrup dressing and plopped stunning poached eggs on top!! Yummy, chewy italian bread on the side, heaven! And easy enough for us to whip up in a few minutes.
I *love* hot bacon dressing, but I’ve never made it with maple syrup. Sounds great!
And that’s no yoke?! hehehe
I love eggs, scrambled, in a omelet/frittata, sunny side up or hard boiled.
For some reason I’ve never had poached eggs.
I’m completely with you; love them all those ways but never had poached. I used to enjoy soft-boiled when I was a kid too…may have to do one of those for old times’ sake this summer. My mom/grandmother used to slice the toast in strips so I could dip (and my mom just recently sent me the old wooden egg holders from when I was a kid)!
I thought that was a great joke and the doubles are beautiful…..such a rich deep yellow.mmmmmm
Yes, I’m loving that yolk color too; I got some eggs from a neighbor and those yolks are all pale…such a difference!
Your chickens really are a colorful lot. I love the color and the double nature of the egg yolks. We buy our eggs from a local farmer and I once cracked open a dozen where every single yolk was double! They must have taken fertility drugs.
Weirdly from what I’ve read, the double yolks probably wouldn’t be viable as fetuses b/c the albumen wouldn’t provide enough nourishment for both chicks. Go figure!
In my country life fantasies, I have chickens. But then I would have to care for them daily, more than egg gathering I suppose. So I can just live vicariously through bloggers and novels where people write about chickens. And fresh eggs. The hen and rooster make a nice looking couple.
PS. Not sure why comment luv isn’t working but I do have recent posts! lol…
Sorry about Comment Luv 🙁 I know there was just an update so that may have something to do with the kinks.
Caring for the chickens actually isn’t as labor intensive as I always thought, actually, although I suppose it “helps” that I’m also doing stuff for the goats at the same time. I have to admit, I’m not a chicken/hen fan (they used to freak me out), but now it’s kind of nice when I go to the garden and they run to greet me. Granted, I know it’s all about the food, but still…. 😉
What an egg-cellent post!
I love deviled eggs! I boil the eggs by putting the eggs in cold water, bringing to a boil, turning off the fire (love cooking with gas) and letting the eggs finish for about 15 minutes in the slowly cooling water. Best to use older eggs for boiling, they peel more easily. Mix the warm yolks with yellow mustard, paprika, and dill pickle relish, salt and pepper. Then stuff the whites with the mixture and hide them from everyone else so that you can eat them ALL!
Chickens are an ambition of mine too but one that will probably remain unfulfilled. I travel far too much to maintain livestock. The cat is challenging enough!
I love deviled eggs too…it is *far* too easy to just keep popping them in my mouth though. I actually *need* someone to come and take them away!
Those hens are a determined lot. They would scare my cat and dog and quickly take over the home.But the results would be worth it. Even if I had to give them the car keys.
Haha driving hens! Love it!
Eggscuse me ~ I’m just clicking over to read the comments 🙂
I think you have some eggstraordinary hens. ;0)
Hahaha…thanks Bella!
my favorite way to enjoy eggs is…boil two eggs hard then remove shell then cut into fours then drizzle olive oil over them , squeeze half a lemon as well , salt and pepper and a nice crusty bun…Yum
Ooh that sounds interesting; will have to try it!
What did you name your chickens, cause i know you did!
I love chickens , my Nona had them in the kitchen which was a slash little barn, the donkey lived there two , not in the cooking area, I collect wooden chickens and glass chickens and ceramic chickens, one of each in my kitchen, I might be able to get a real one sometime in the future as they are changing the bylaw to allow for this.{believe or not}
Actually Paolo only named the rooster–Jimmy. Hah! I’m happy to hear some places are changing laws/ordinances on small farm animals. Even goats are being allowed in more places!
Now, if she’d just keep laying those double-yolked eggs you’d have it made. We don’t have chickens (yet), but we do have neighbors who give us fresh eggs once in a while and we usually have an egg-based dinner once a week. Those fresh eggs make all the difference!
So true, Mary; glad you have a nice neighbor! Actually one of our neighbors gave me six eggs the other day despite my protests that we have our own hens…can’t say no (as you know)! Now I have to figure out what to give her….
My favorite restaurant in DC makes a dish called ‘Eggs Chesapeake’ for Sunday brunch which is the best…two poached eggs on English muffins and lump crab cakes with Old Bay hollandaise sauce…Mmmmmmmmmm! Since I just found a place that sells real crabmeat, I might have to try and recreate it!
Just curious, what color are their eggs?
Oh that sounds lovely…and kudos on the crabmeat! I *love* crabmeat! Our hens all lay light brown colored eggs.
Awesome eggs, Michelle! My favorite way to eat eggs is over easy so I can still dip my toasted bread into the slightly runny yolks…yum! My second favorite is as a ricotta and pasta frittata!
Mmm love the “dippy eggs” as we call ’em 😉
Your other kids here are so pretty! Some day we are going to get some chicks to have our own eggs too…so good and yours are scrumptious…look at those yolks color! Enjoy!
Thanks Pam! Hope you get some chicks soon 🙂
those eggs look delicious!!!
Very tasty indeed, Janet!
so u have a real agriturismo down there (in Calabria;) and bio-eggs, soo cool:-)i collcted 2 cucumbers from my garden-balcony…and 4 strawberries!have a loveyly rest of the week…
You too Jana! Love homegrown strawberries and cukes!
Your hens and rooster are adorable Michelle and the eggs look so rich and delicious. Yum yum!!!!!!!!!!!! I love eggs any old way but my very favorite is deviled eggs and with those yolks of yours, WOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Almost everything you post makes me reminisce about something. Back in the day (as the young ones say now) they used to sell little rabbits and chicks at the pet store around Easter time. Somehow Dad bought a couple for us and Grandma also and someone else and we ended up with six little chicks. We kept them in the back yard and they would roam around. No one ever bothered them but we were constantly looking for them so Dad placed chicken wire all around the house. One afternoon I played hookey from school as we used to walk home from school for lunch in those days (unheard of today). So the teacher sent Barbara Canning to my home to get me as almost everyone in class took the afternoon off and she was annoyed. Barbara showed up in my back yard and there I was on a lung chair with all these chicks who had grown into roosters and hens climbing up and down around me. I can never forget the expression on her face to see me laying there with hens and roosters in New York City. LOL I actually thought of this just the other day after telling you how I am decorating my Croatian kitchen with roosters and hens. I was trying to remember all the names. There was Whitey, Blackie, Kingie, Queenie, The Runt and for the life of me I just can’t remember the name of the sixth one!!!!!!!!!!! Maybe it will come to me if I think hard enough. LOL
Haha, they do become quite “domesticated” after a while. I’m not at the petting stage yet, but they do follow me around now.
Sorry about the typo. I meant to say “lounge chair” and not “lung chair”. Oh, and I just remembered the last name. It was “Reddie”. Our names were not very original, I am afraid. They kind of went by color of the animal and perhaps which male or female had that regal aura to its walk. Who knows. We were just little children and guess what, I now own that house after my mom and dad passed and the chicken wire is still there. I get tears in my eyes every time I see the wire!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It was such a long time ago!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Haha, my family had a chicken/rooster named Red, I think, when my brother was little; it had been caught in a car engine as a little guy, so he had a broken wing, I think. My grandfather brought him home, but I wasn’t around yet, so I don’t remember any of that 😉
funny, I remember the opposite, the older the hen, the larger the eggs. I used to have some barred rocks who laid double yolk eggs. to us they were treasure, enjoy!
Well usually larger hens lay larger eggs–I don’t know about the age factor–but when they are just starting out for the year, all kinds of funny things happen, extra-large, extra-small, etc. 🙂
I have never seen double yolks before. Your yolks look beautiful.
Thanks Esme!
“Interestingly, the very first eggs out of all of them were small and super softshell…like squishy even, which I had never seen before. I don’t know if they’re edible but I sure wasn’t going to find out. Ew.”
Forgot about the extremely small and soft shell eggs. Do remember from when I was probably ten or so my mother’s old Sicilian aunt giving the hens crushed sea shells to make the egg shell stronger. I think that chickens need some kind of gritty substance in their diet.
I think that the dark yolks are due to the fact that the chickens are “free-range’ and not spending their life locked in a coop.
We give the hens their own egg shells to munch on; they love them! I have to admit, I’m loving the yolk color 🙂
Well, anyone who knows me knows that eggs are my absolute favorite food. For that reason I go out of my way to buy eggs from a lady who raises beautiful chickens. The eggs are unreal, with deep orange yolks. She knows I like the largest eggs, so sometimes I end up with double yolks in some eggs! It’s such a nice surprise when that happens. I love your double yolk hard boiled eggs. I will have to do that!
I *love* eggs too. So much protein and goodness…and so tasty and versatile!
Wow, that is so awesome that you are getting double yolks – my favorite part of the egg for sure!!! YUM. Such pretty hens and a handsome rooster to be sure. Did you get them all as chicks?
We didn’t get these as chicks; they were slightly older. We did get some chicks this year (not newborn as they were already sexed), and they will all be, ahem, dinner. I’m not allowed to meet them lest they NEVER become dinner 😉
I have also seen the double yolks from hubby’s grandparents farm. I always make omlettes but your picture of the hard boiled eggs makes a better presentation, I will do that next time!
I can’t take credit for the idea as I saw it online, but it is a fun way to “display” the yolks, isn’t it?!
Oh I love my chickens, too. Thanks to a neighbor dog we now have only two left but we, too, have 6 pulcini “waiting in the wings,” ha ha! And a turkey baby. It is so comforting to just sit and watch the chickens walk about and pick at the ground, making their little chicken noises. I take my morning coffee out to the “back forty” and just sit and enjoy them and the coffee. I also love the smell of the chicken coop! It seems so right and elemental.
It is *super* relaxing to watch them…Paolo and I joke often that we have our own Discovery Channel…live 🙂
That is so cool!!
Thanks FH!