Selfsufficientish.com

Thanks for that - why didn't I look at Hughie's book? I reckon my mistake happened in the first ten seconds... too much oil too soon. I'll have a go once I've been shopping for more oil.

Little update here from the Battery Hens Welfare Trust newsletter :

If the kids want a burger you can be guilt free if you visit McDonalds. Their eggs and mayo is all free range. They get the 3 rd and final Golden Egg this time around. FOWL FACT: Did you know that McDonalds insisted that Hellmans produce a free range mayo for use in McDonalds burgers? You can get more details online at www.makeupyourownmind.co.uk or call Customer Services on 08705 244622.

How's THAT for astonishing? If they can produce it for McDs - surely they can produce it for us??

PurpleDragon wrote:

All eggs used by Unilever UK Foods are sourced from within the EU.

[snip]

It is also important to highlight that there is insufficient farm capacity at this time to sustain support for the Hellmann's business with free-range eggs.

It raises an interesting question though.... is it better to use hens from a decent British/EU farm, traceable, low food miles, cleaned, non-caged, and where they do things provide some form of entertainment for the hens, perches etc but where they still overstock, clip beaks and use a lot of anti-biotics or is better to use free-range eggs that come from far away, that may not be free-range at all, or maybe are free range but are just overstocked in a field instead of overstocked in a barn and still live short miserable lives.

I am never quite sure where my preference for local un-organic (unpackaged) food v. organic packaged and shipped from far away food... I've certainly seems (on TV) some non-free range chicken meat farms that I would be too concerned about eating from... basically, they may not see the sun or scratch around around for their 12 to 16 weeks of life, but they do have perches, they don't walk around in their poo and get burns all over their legs and they do have natural light cycles (ie: its not light all the time or dark all the time). But then I don't if these farms really exist, or if it was just made to look good for TV ....

Well, I am of a slightly similar opinion - I just don't trust the media. I know that there are ghastly Auszhwitz (sp?) type places where the birds are just treated dreadfully all their lives, but apparently there is a 'barn egg' place locally to me where the conditions of the birds is okay, except they never get outside.

For me, I just won't eat any eggs that aren't free range. I think, to a certain extent, one has to take what one considers the lesser of two evils - I would rather the birds had a decent life and were maybe bussed up from Somerset than get local eggs where the hens were treated badly.

I know, I know - when you chose the less of two evils you are still choosing an evil, but what can you do? Not everyone can have their own hens, can they?

well I buy 'free range' when I have to buy them (rather than being given them by my parents who keep chickens), because I figure they are liars... or exagerators at least... so my 'free range' eggs might really only be 'barn'
I think 'barn' eggs are fine - in fact my parents hens live in a run - before that they were free-range - but the foxes kept eating them. you see you have to decide where to draw the line at 'living naturally' cos sometimes that means a horrible death to a preditor - and actually chickens are not native to UK so maybe weshould not keep them.?
And then there are lots of people who refer to their free range hens that they keep in an ark.. which confuses me.
So my stance is that hens should have a nice house nice perch not be overcrowed and have a nice hen run to live in.. free from predators and as soon as we get to it.. thats what we shall be building. Free range would be a mistake here with the number of foxes that we have.

I buy free range cos I think i will at least be getting my ideal that way.

As for mayo - perhaps it would be more logical to ask for 'barn happy chicken' mayo first - and maybe work up to free range.

Sadly the livestock standards for "free range" are still shockingly low. If you are buying to ensure a reasonable standard of life for the birds, the only way to go is to buy organic. Or keep your own birds, of course - if you build a "chicken penthouse" it only has a footprint of something like 6'x8', with the housing over the run. And if foxes are a problem, there's always electric fencing!

ive emailed them too

Have you seen the posters, we did guys Hellmans is now free range!!! Power to the people.

Well it's possible that they worked out it would sell more jars of mayo but either way at least they have switched.

Andy Hamilton wrote:Have you seen the posters, we did guys Hellmans is now free range!!! Power to the people.

I bought (I know! ) a jar of Co-Op mayonnaise this morning, and it states on the label, "The co-operative mayonnaise. Made with free range eggs". The ingredients list also states that the eggs used are free range. Don't know how long that's been the case, but



Lynne

We had been buying M+S mayo for ages (free range) but it got too expensive maybe we'll give co-op a whirl.

I still woudn't buy Hellmans cause it is owned by unilever and I have a problem with huge multi-national, multi-product companies.

Free Range... it's a big step forward but is it enough? What are the chickens fed on? Do they use GM free grain to feed them, and how much daylight access do the birds have?

Is it possible for a big multinational co that is producing mayo in such huge quantities to source all organic freerange eggs.

Oh... and HW - did you ever manage to make your own?