More egg-y stuff: repackaged eggs

I don't know if you've ever seen these in your stores before.

This is a carton of repackaged eggs. When several cartons of eggs have a few damaged ones inside, the store will sometimes repackage the good eggs into a new conatiner, and toss out the cracked ones.

The outside of this carton indicates the store number and date of repacking, in handwriting. The carton says that the eggs are Medium Grade B, but upon opening the carton . . .

I can see that these are larger than Mediums, most look like Large and a couple look Extra-Large. This looks like a carton of eggs of varying size (but given designation of Medium, meaning the one dozen eggs in this carton weigh the minimum of 21 ounces, but likely more).

Grade usually refers to the condition of the shell, whether or not it's misshapen or has slight staining. (But these eggs don't appear to have exterior abnormalities.) As well, Grade can refer to interior condition of each egg, such as how large of an air pocket the egg contains or the thickness of the white portion of the egg -- both of which is determined by candling.

The outside of this carton of eggs also has a space to write in the candling date, but nothing is recorded in that space.

Here's a photo comparing a "regular" Large egg on the left (from a carton of eggs I already had at home), to a repackaged egg on the right. All of the repackaged eggs are large compared to my "regular" eggs.


Regulations concerning the repacking of eggs varies by state. Overall, eggs to be repacked cannot be past the sell-by date, contaminated with egg from other cracked eggs, or packed into a dirty carton. If there is no new sell-by date, 30 days from the repacking date is the general guide for safety and freshness.

These repackaged eggs are sold at a discount over the store's regular price for eggs. I bought 3 dozen of these eggs on Senior Discount day at Fred Meyer, for $1.19 less the 10% discount = my price of $1.07 per dozen.

I have found repackaged eggs on a couple of occasions, at a couple of different stores. They are usually set to the side, but still in the egg cooler, and have hand-written information about packaging, as well as pricing directly on the carton (not a tag on the shelf). My experience has been that these eggs show up late Monday or early Tuesday. Just an FYI. Keep your eyes open.

As for using these eggs in my kitchen, when I bring home cartons of repacked eggs, I move these cartons to the front of the line, for use ahead of any other eggs I may have purchased -- just to be safe. Otherwise, they are just as good as any other egg I buy.

Cheap & Cheerful suppers for the week

A little more than 1 week listed here. Some of these days were very stressful days, some were very busy and 2 of the days I was sick and could barely pull dinner together.

One of the stressful days I spent in the walk-in clinic with one of my daughters, as she had a longboard accident that required medical attention and stitches. We were there for 3 hours, and when I came home I had to quickly rush putting a dinner together.

One of the days that I was sick, the best I could do for dinner was the chunky tomato-basil soup, made from canned tomatoes and tomato paste. We had leftover biscuits and a pie that I had baked earlier in the week, along with cheese quesadillas made with frozen flour tortillas.

So, for me, it is still possible to pull together something (anything) to eat for the 5 of us, even on hard days. Its just not well-thought out or gourmet, but still frugal. But hey, mom isn't a super-hero!



Friday
home-fried tortilla chips, refried black beans, quick salsa, tossed green salad

Saturday
ham and egg fried rice, with cabbage, radish greens, onions, celery, topped with chopped peanuts

Sunday
homemade black olive and onion pizza

Monday
make-your-own ham and cheese sandwiches, on French bread, with lettuce and pickles, apple slices, mixed nuts, cookies and chocolates

Tuesday
Oven-roasted, teriyaki chicken leg quarters, vegetable fried rice

Wednesday
leftover chicken with canned tomatoes, onions, garlic, with linguine, and sauteed onions, cabbage and kale; rhubarb pie for dessert

Thursday
Asian chicken soup, Cheddar Bay biscuits, rhubarb pie and strawberries

Friday
chunky tomato-basil soup, leftover biscuits, cheese quesadillas, green salad, plum pie
(with the quesadillas -- I had some leftover salsa in the fridge, and just this week I found a bunch of volunteer cilantro in a pot on the deck, from last year's plants, so I added a few leaves of cilantro to the salsa -- yum!))

Saturday
leftovers from hostessing a reception after a memorial service (sandwiches and other finger food), plus apple wedges and leftover plum pie

Sunday
tamale pie made with 2 ground beef patties, black beans, olives, canned tomatoes, sweet bell pepper, onion, seasonings, cornbread batter and cheddar cheese

Monday
fried corn tortillas, refried black beans, cheddar cheese, slaw-type salad made with cabbage, chopped canned tomatoes, cilantro, chili powder, onion powder, oil, vinegar and salt, fresh strawberries, brownies

Comparing the cost of peanut butter to eggs, for lunch-making

So, peanut butter is on sale this week for $4.99 for a 64-oz jar, or $1.24 a pound. That's a fabulous price for peanut butter. But is it the best price for a protein source for lunch sandwiches?

My first thought is to stock up like crazy on peanut butter, and be done with the question of what kind of sandwiches to have available for summer. But I do want to know, could there be less expensive lunch-time offerings?

Other sandwich possibilities include cheese (at about $2 per pound), luncheon meat (best price for me -- on markdown for about $1.76 per pound), bean spreads at about 50-75 cents per pound (can be the most frugal) and eggs (right now about 64 - 72 cents per pound).

There was a time when peanut butter was always the most frugal lunch choice. That's just not the case, any longer. So, I have to weigh this out for myself, and find some alternatives that are easy and welcomed by my family.

I will certainly be making some bean-based spreads for summer lunches. But also want some quick and easy options (bean spread requires soaking and cooking the beans first). The luncheon meat, I think, is best reserved for too-busy evenings, when making sandwiches is about all I have time for. And cheese is kinda pricey for use more than once per week for sandwich fillings, but I do use frequently in preparing dinners.

That leaves me with eggs. Eggs are priced per dozen. That does make it difficult to compare the price of eggs by weight, to other foods. However, I use a nice little calculation shortcut, when comparing eggs to other ingredients. Mostly, I buy large eggs. Large eggs are the size that are typically on sale at Walgreen's, Target and other grocery stores, so most often the best buy for me.

A dozen large eggs weigh about 24 ounces, each egg weighing 2 ounces. So, 8 large eggs weigh 1 pound. My price per egg is about 8-9 cents, these days. (I carry that tidbit of info in my head, as I comparison shop or figure the cost of making any recipe.) So, at 8-9 cents per egg, multiplied by 8 eggs to make a pound -- my price per pound, on large eggs, is currently between 64 and 72 cents for one pound.

The price of using eggs in lunches is not quite half that of using peanut butter. So, while I'll buy some peanut butter this week (maybe 3 or 4 large jars, to last through October), for summer lunches, I will also be planning ahead to make more egg salad. My plan with the peanut butter is to ration it out for the summer, and encourage family members to use the alternatives that I provide.

In case you wish to compare the prices of eggs per pound to other food items, here's my list of how many eggs it takes to equal 1 pound.

Eggs are "sized" by how much a dozen eggs weigh. So, the eggs that you buy in the store "must" meet a minimum net weight to qualify to be labeled a specific size. Knowing this makes calculating our price per pound on eggs, reliable, without having to get out the scale at home and weigh each carton.

To figure your price per pound on eggs:

Figure your price per egg, based on your current egg prices. Multiply that price per egg by how many eggs are in a pound (using the info below), for whichever size of eggs you've purchased. It's that simple. I like that it's the large eggs that go on sale most often AND are the only size of eggs that have a nice, even, round number to make my calculations with.

• jumbo eggs --- 6.4 eggs per pound
• extra-large eggs --- 7.11 eggs per pound
• large eggs --- 8 eggs per pound
• medium eggs --- 9.14 eggs per pound
• small eggs --- 10.66 eggs per pound
• peewee eggs --- 12.8 eggs per pound

What will be going into summer brown bag lunches at your place?