Celebrate World Egg Day!

Eggs are a universal food, an important part of cuisines around the globe. Every culture has its own recipes for egg dishes. Although some of these dishes have different names and often include different flavoring foods, many are similar.

We think of the omelet we eat in the U.S. today as an original French recipe, but it was first made out of eggs and honey by ancient Romans. You make this type of omelet by moving beaten eggs around in a pan until they cook into a lumpy circle. Then, after you add a filling of flavoring foods, you simply flip one side of the egg circle over the filling and your half-moon-shaped omelet is done.

Both the Italian frittata and the Spanish tortilla are even easier. For these flat, round omelets, you cook the filling foods in a pan and pour the beaten eggs over them. Then, you just let the dish cook until the eggs are almost set. To finish the top, you can cover the pan and let steam set the eggs or you can put the pan in the oven or under the broiler. You can also get fancy and flip the omelet over to cook the second side. In both ancient Persia and modern Iran, an herb-flavored omelet called coucou sabzi is made in the very same way.

Chinese egg foo yung is very much like a frittata or a tortilla. The difference is that egg foo yung comes out shaped like a patty because it’s made in the bottom of a wok, a pan shaped like a flat-bottomed funnel. In Japan, thin omelets are made in a rectangular pan and rolled up tightly. In several Asian countries, thin omelets are sometimes cut into strips before being mixed with other foods. Other Asian omelets are purposefully made with lacy holes so that the filling foods show through.

All these dishes are very much alike, but the flavoring of the foods depends on tastes that have developed because of the foods that could be grown, raised or harvested in each country.

Egg farmers around the world are joining together and increasing their commitment to provide a high-quality food product to help feed the world’s hungry. During the past year, egg producers who are members of the International Egg Commission (IEC) have donated the equivalent of more than $7 million, and more than 22 million eggs to help people everywhere.

Here at home, America’s egg farmers have donated more than 28 million eggs to the hungry and served up free egg breakfasts to those in need as part of the Good Egg Project, which was started in 2009 to help educate people about where eggs come from and encourage Americans to take up the fight against hunger. In North Carolina alone, egg farmers donated over 1/4 million eggs during Hunger Action Month this year to Central and Eastern NC Food Banks.

Help egg farmers in their commitment by simply taking the Good Egg Project pledge at www.goodeggproject.org to “Eat good. Do good every day.” For every pledge made, America’s egg farmers will donate eggs to Feeding America, the nation’s largest hunger relief organization.