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Comment by thomholwerda | Hacker News Reader

I think some supermarkets fridge their eggs, some don't here in The Netherlands. However, I have never seen anyone not fridge their eggs at home. In fact, it seems crazy gross to me to keep eggs outside of the fridge at room temperature. I wouldn't want to eat an egg that wasn't stored "properly" (i.e., our definition of properly). This is probably entirely irrational, but there it is.

Interestingly, the 'official' Dutch storage advice for eggs [1] states they are to be kept in the fridge, because it reduces the risk of salmonella and makes sure they dry out less quickly.

[1] http://www.voedingscentrum.nl/encyclopedie/eieren.aspx

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However, I have never seen anyone not fridge their eggs at home

That is just a cultural/educational thing. For a first-timer you could visit me, or my entire family for that matter, in Belgium. That's not too far away. Eggs never go in the fridge here. But I know people that put them in the fridge as well.

Even if we get them in a store where they are cooled, we don't put them in the fridge afterwards. And if we get them fresh from our chicken we just mark the date on them and put them in an egg-box in a normal room. Without washing nor removing the occasional small amounts of dried up faeces on them. We also have a tendency to try to figure out how long an egg stays well. Record is something like 6 weeks :P

Counter anecdote: I am dutch and never keep my eggs in the fridge.

Ditto

At the supermarkets in South Africa they're not refrigerated. So I buy these unrefrigerated eggs and bring them home to put them into the fridge, because that's how I was raised

The problem is my fridge can only hold about a dozen eggs but I buy them in trays of 48. The ones that can't fit have to fend for themselves outside in the cupboard. I eat eggs from the fridge, and bring reinforcements in from the cupboard to replace the eaten ones.

This whole process strikes me as absurd (especially since I recall a chef at a cooking class saying that it's preferable to cook things at room temperature) but I do it anyway. Where do I fit in?

It's best to keep the eggs in the carton they came in anyway[0]. Do refrigerators there still come with those silly egg "holders?"

[0]-http://eggs.ab.ca/recipes-tips/handling-storage

If you put some in the fridge and some not, I'd definitely start eating the ones not in the fridge first, and slowly move the ones in the fridge out of the fridge well before you use them. They're better to cook with if they're at room temperature.

I am English. It never even occured to me that people would put eggs in the fridge.

What did you think the egg holder in the fridge was for ?

Yes, eggs absorb odours and so a bad idea to keep them in the fridge.

I've never seen a Dutch supermarket keep eggs refridgerated, and putting them in the fridge at home seems like a custom from a distant past. I know that when I was young, fridges did have a little egg tray, but I don't know anyone who keeps their eggs in the fridge nowadays.

And it's better for the egg not to. You can use it right away if you don't keep it refridgerated. A cold egg behaves different in cooking (though I forgot the details), so you have to take it out of the fridge 10 minutes before you use it.

To me, the clincher is that supermarkets don't store their eggs in the fridge. If refridgeration was important, supermarkets would be required to do that. Also, despite refridgerating their eggs, the US seems to have a lot of salmonella cases.

I'm in Czech republic and I generally keep eggs in fridge, but I have seen people who keep eggs in some other "dark and cold place" (eg. bread-room), but nobody I know stores eggs just in the open. On a similar note everyone here seems to have different opinion as to whether should frying oil be kept in fridge or not.

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