Now that my girls have bounced back from their strike last fall, eggs are once again in abundant supply. Since last fall, I’ve gone from getting no eggs to a few eggs to more than we can eat. Preserving excess eggs by water glassing takes little to no effort, however, and won’t take up space in the fridge or freezer.
I use one gallon size glass jars. You could use food grade plastic buckets with lids, but I had some of these jars on hand. Going with the one-gallon size also kept me from putting too many eggs in there and causing some shells to crack.
I use my kitchen scale to measure out one ounce of lime for every one quart of water. Don’t forget to zero out the tare to account for the weight of the jar.
Store bought eggs will not work with this preservation method. Use only farm fresh, clean unwashed eggs. Make sure there are no cracks in the shells. Place the eggs in the gallon jar and pour the lime/water mixture over the eggs. It will look like watered down milk until the lime settles. This is normal.
Make sure that the eggs are completely covered by the lime water. Place your excess eggs in here as you get them and add extra lime water when you need to to make sure the eggs stay covered. When the jar is full, label it and keep it out of direct sunlight. The eggs should be shelf stable for a year or so.
When you need to use the eggs, wash them off really well in water and use as normal. I always crack mine in a bowl or cup before adding them to anything just to make sure they still smell good and are edible.
Most of the eggs I have tried looked like I just cracked a fresh egg. The egg white was a little runnier, and I could tell the yolk was not as firm, but overall, they looked pretty good for having been in a jar preserved in lime water.
Some of the eggs completely lost their form, but still smelled like a fresh egg.
If you use this preservation method and find eggs where the shell has formed a crack while it’s been in the lime water, I advise not using those particular eggs.
What about you? How do you preserve excess eggs?