Egg recall drives worried customers to farmers markets

Jackie Dearing of Bloomington, Ill., sold all of her 50 dozen eggs at the local farmers market on Saturday, including carton after carton to new customers worried about a large and growing salmonella scare linked to millions of grocery store eggs.

“Almost everybody who came to our booth mentioned it,” said Dearing, whose family runs Dearing Country Farms, a small-scale meat and poultry business. “Anytime something like this happens, people think a lot more about where their food comes from.”

As a recall of more than 550 million eggs tied to two industrial manufacturers widens , small egg farmers across the United States are echoing Dearing’s experience. Sales of eggs at farmers markets, co-operatives and roadside stands reportedly spiked over the weekend as news of the outbreak linked to at least 1,300 illnesses reached shoppers.

“I think this is the consumer’s way of saying, ‘Until this blows over, I’ll get my eggs from another source,’” said Susan S. Joy, general manager of the Nebraska Poultry Industries, an agency based in Lincoln, Neb., that represents all branches of the turkey and egg industry including both small growers and large farms.

At a farmer’s market in Redmond, Wash., Sue Martinell of Sky Valley Family Farm sold out of 80 dozen chicken eggs on Saturday, leaving only duck eggs to buy.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/38819740/ns/health-food_safety/

I'm betting that a lot of people will never go back to factory eggs after they experience real ones.

We're a retired couple running a five-hundred apple tree orchard. We have three hens that run on grass, give us eggs with perky, dark yellow yolks. Store-bought eggs are tasteless as far as we're concerned.

maybe as long as they're at the farmers markets,they'll by the rest of their produce there. start supporting local growers and stop subsidizing agribiz...

Sadly, I think this is how it always goes. People forget so quickly. If they didn't forget, we probably would have no factory farms left. Mad cow, tainted chickens, hamburger scare after hamburger scare. Just wait for the first super sale on eggs at the grocery store and these people will be back to buying these eggs. Too bad. I just hope that my egg lady doesn't sell out of eggs all the time now. I got the last two dozen the other day, and that has never happened before. Well, good for her.

Never went for it myself, but lots of people liked what they called cannibal sandwiches. You can't do that with store-bought beef any more because of he highly unsanitary slaughter process. It didn't used to be that way. The meat was kept clean from the time it was a cow until you got your grubby little hands on it.

Because people may be eating, I won't go into the exact nature of the unsanitary conditions in the big commercial slaughter houses.

through. I still eat raw hamburger. I figure there is little that can make me sick. Maybe genetic? My mother used to tell me about an uncle of hers who ate raw pork chops---and this was when she was little, 20's and 30's. I always thought that the conditions then must have been terrible, but maybe not.

OK, now that I have grossed you out, I will be gone.