By Alhaji Alhasan Abdulai
The whole world over including Ghana eggs from chicken and other birds from the wild are being used the world over as popular food for all ages. A research from the University of Alberta in the United States of America has said that “While eggs are well known to be an excellent source of proteins, lipids, vitamins and minerals, researchers at the University of Alberta recently discovered they also contain antioxidant properties, which helps in the prevention of cardiovascular disease and cancer.
Jianping Wu, Andreas Schieber and graduate students Chamila Nimalaratne and Daise Lopes-Lutz of the U of A Department of Agricultural Food and Nutritional Science examined egg yolks produced by hens fed typical diets of either primarily wheat or corn. They found the yolks contained two amino acids, tryptophan and tyrosine, which have high antioxidant properties.
After analyzing the properties, the researchers determined that two egg yolks in their raw state have almost twice as many antioxidant properties as an apple and about the same as half a serving (25 grams) of cranberries.
However, when the eggs were fried or boiled, antioxidant properties were reduced by about half, and a little more than half of the eggs were cooked in a microwave.
"It's a big reduction but it still leaves eggs equal to apples in their antioxidant value," said Wu.
published in the peer-reviewed journal Food Chemistry. The discovery of these two amino acids, while important, may only signify the beginning of finding antioxidant properties in egg yolks, said Wu, an associate professor of agricultural, food and nutritional science.
"Ultimately, we're trying to map antioxidants in egg yolks so we have to look at all of the properties in the yolks that could contain antioxidants, as well as how the eggs are ingested," said Wu, adding that he and his team will examine the other type of antioxidant already known to be in eggs, carotenoids, the yellow pigment in egg yolk, as well as peptides.
In previous research, Wu found that egg proteins were converted by enzymes in the stomach and small intestines and produced peptides that act the same way as ACE inhibitors, prescriptions drugs that are used to lower high blood pressure.
That finding defied common wisdom and contradicted the public perception that eggs increased high blood pressure because of their high cholesterol content. Additional research by Wu suggests the peptides can be formulated to help prevent and treat hypertension.
Wu is convinced the peptides also have some antioxidant properties, which leads him to suggest that when he completes the next step in his research, the result will likely be that eggs have more antioxidant properties than we currently know.
Meanwhile a publication in the Daily Meal has given 16 ways people eat eggs around the world
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Ways People Eat Eggs around the World
Which came first, the domestication of fowl or human consumption of the egg? Humans have been eating eggs since ancient times, although the recipes we use have surely come a long way. Some scholars think domestication of fowl began around 6,000 B.C. in China. Ancient Romans ate peafowl eggs, while pigeon eggs were popular in China; the Phoenicians had ostrich eggs, and elsewhere people have consumed the eggs of gulls, pelicans, ducks, geese, turtles, and even alligators. Here’s how 17 countries around the world enjoy eggs.
Australia: Bacon, Egg, and Barbecue Roll
Fried onions, fried egg, bacon, and barbecue sauce on a toasty roll? Sign us up.
Austria: Eierkuchen
This Austrian egg cake’s usual recipe includes beaten eggs, breadcrumbs, green onions, and optional Cheddar cheese.
Argentina: Matambre
Matambre consists of very thinly sliced flank steak stuffed with hard-boiled eggs, vegetables, and herbs, then broiled or oven roasted. It’s sliced and served hot or cold.
China: Century Egg
Don’t worry, the Chinese century egg, also known as pidan, is actually only a few weeks to a couple of months old. It’s made by preserving duck, chicken, or quail eggs in clay, ash, salt, quicklime, and rice hulls, and letting the eggs age until they become briny and gelatinous.
Ethiopia: Doro Wat
This slow-cooked chicken stew contains whole hard-boiled eggs and is eaten by scooping the stew with injera, or flat pancakes made of a millet-like grain called teff.
France: Croque Madame
The croque monsieur, a quintessential French dish, is transformed into the croque madame simply by adding a fried or poached egg on top of the ham and cheese sandwich. It can be enjoyed any time of the day.
Greece: Avgolemono
This creamy, lemony egg sauce is popular with vegetable dishes and also blends well with ground meat or rice; diluted with chicken stock, it makes an excellent soup.
India: Egg Curry
To make this delicious vegetarian dish, take a traditional onion, tomato, and green chili curry and liven it up with a few eggs.
Israel: Shakshuka
These poached eggs are blended together in a pan with onions, garlic, bell pepper, and tomato paste, often spiced with chili and cumin. This dish can be enjoyed at breakfast, lunch, or dinner.Shutterstock
Italy: La Stracciatella
This Italian egg-drop soup is made with eggs, grated cheese, and a pinch of nutmeg, added to chicken stock with carrots and celery. It’s often eaten around the time of Easter.
Japan: Onsen Tamago
This Japanese delicacy is prepared by slow-cooking an egg a low temperature in spring water until the yolk takes on a custard-like quality. Once the shell is removed, the egg is served in a small cup of broth and soy sauce.
Mexico: Huevos Rancheros
The name literally means “rancher’s eggs,” but you don’t have to be a farmhand to love fried eggs and tomato-chile sauce atop corn tortillas with a side of rice and beans.
New Zealand: Bacon and Egg Pie
This New Zealand dish is a puff pastry filled with bacon and eggs, baked in a pie dish with a lid on top until brown. It's perfect for breakfast or an afternoon snack.
Phillipines: Balut
This dish is not for the faint of heart. Conventionally sold as a street food in the Philippines, balut is a developing duck embryo that’s boiled alive and eaten straight out of the shell. It's also sometimes cooked adobo-style – with vinegar, soy sauce, and bay leaves – or baked into pastries.
Tunisia: Brik
This samosa-like food envelops a whole egg in a pastry triangle with onion, tuna, harissa, and parsley. Then the whole thing is deep-fried and sometimes garnished with capers and cheese.
United Kingdom: Scotch Eggs
Scotch eggs probably originated in London, despite their name, but no matter where they came from, hard-boiled eggs wrapped in sausage, breaded, and deep-fried are an ingenious invention.
Things You Didn't Know About Eggs
Chicken eggs are one of the most commonly eaten foods on the planet, and also one of the most versatile. They can be fried, poached, hard-boiled, deviled, coddled, shirred, or scrambled, and are incorporated, both cooked and raw, into thousands of recipes. They’re the glue that holds much of the food we eat together, from brownies to meatloaf, and on top of all that, they’re delicious and nutritious. But we bet that there are some things that you didn’t know about the incredibly versatile egg.
Things You Didn't Know About Eggs (Slideshow)
Egg consumption statistics are mind-boggling. Every year, more than 6.6 billion dozen eggs (more than 79 billion in total) are produced in the United States, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture predicts that each American eats about 255 eggs per year — which is actually down from the 1950s, when annual egg consumption was around 400 per person. There are about 280 million egg-laying chickens in the U.S., and egg farms even have their own advocacy groups, among them the Iowa Egg Council, the Virginia Egg Council, and the New England Brown Egg Council.
More on Eggs
Bird eggs have been a valuable food source since prehistoric times, and since then eggs have been an indispensable part of global cuisine, appearing in everything from Middle Eastern shakshuka to Taiwanese oyster omelettes, from Mexican huevos rancheros to Iranian baghali ghatogh, from Italian frittatas to British kedgeree, and from Jewish matzo brei to Japanese okonomiyaki. Their uses really are infinite.
Read on to learn a whole bunch of things you most likely didn’t know about chicken eggs, from what the top egg-producing state is to what the name of that little white squiggly thing inside every raw egg is. Eggs are one of those foods that you either love or hate — some people gag at the smell of them, and others eat one for breakfast every day, like Abraham Lincoln did (fun fact) — but you have to admit, eggs are one of the most indispensable foods in existence.
The Most Common Breed of Egg-Laying Chicken is the White Leghorn
A must-have at every farm is egg breed which was first imported to America in 1828 from the Italian port city of Livorno; leghorn is an anglicization of the city's name. (Fans of the old Loony Tunes and Merrie Melodies cartoons may remember the strutting, stentorian rooster Foghorn J. Leghorn.)
Iowa is America's Top Egg-Producing State
In all the egg industry has recorded one of the largest eggs in the United States of America. Nearly 15 billion eggs (which constitute a lot of eggs) are produced in Iowa every year, with the egg industry employing about 8,000 workers. Other top egg-producing states include Ohio, Indiana, and Pennsylvania.
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