Four decades of calumnies have come to an end. Eggs are not bad for you. Go ahead: have two or three.
OSCAR WILDE BELIEVED eggs were an adventure because the next one could always be something different. Chef Wylie Dufresne, owner of Manhattan restaurant wd~50 and an Adrian Ferrà protégé, says his ultimate fantasy is to take a bath in hollandaise sauce. Louis Saulnier’s 1914 culinary classic, Le Répertoire de la Cuisine, lists 422 egg dishes – but only where the eggs are the star of the show.
In the kitchen, home or restaurant, eggs rule supreme, not just for their economy and versatility, but because of their potential for ingenuity. In addition to being nutritious and remarkably good value, they have been used in nearly every cuisine since the Chinese started raising hens. The Mexicans make huevos rancheros; the French scramble them with leftover vegetables and meat to make frittata; and the Israelis bake them with roasted red peppers and tomatoes to make shakshuka. Even the ancient Romans enjoyed chicken’s meat and eggs.
Yet for the past 40 years, “Eating eggs is bad for your heart” had been the law de jure in every dietician’s book.
You can forget that well-meaning but erroneous advice. Eggs, as unbelievable as this may sound, are not necessarily bad for you. In fact, eating eggs regularly, if you’re not diabetic, could be beneficial to your health.
Researchers at the University of Surrey fed two eggs per day to overweight but otherwise healthy volunteers. For 12 weeks, the volunteers followed a reduced calorie diet prescribed by the British Heart Foundation, which normally advises people to eat no more than three to four eggs per week. Individuals in the group lost between 3-4kg and saw a fall in their average blood cholesterol level.
Notwithstanding this research, head researcher Bruce Griffin still found that an aversion to eggswas widespread, while a January 2009 survey by the Egg Nutrition Centre found that one in four Americans still avoided eggs “for fear of dietary cholesterol.”
“Linking egg consumption with high blood cholesterol and heart disease is a common, ingrained misconception,” according to Griffin, and it is based on outdated evidence.
Our institutional aversion to eggs was basically a fad. According to Dr Alex McIntosh of Texas A&M University in The Symbolization of Eggs in American Culture: A Sociological Analysis, food scares typically occurred in the US every 30 to 50 years and are characterized by the following concerns: adulteration (the perception that foods contain real or imagined contaminant); alienation (a feeling of mistrust for foods or the food system); and hubris (the claim made by food moralists that “food consumers, producers and processors have overstepped their natural limits.”)
In the 1960s, food moralists – groups of individuals that strive to persuade society about their perceptions of food and the food system – initiated a food scare after suspicions arose about the unhealthy practices of food processing and the substances humans were ingesting or that were left behind in the environment: pesticides, growth hormones, dyes and the likes.
Beginning with the 1962 publication of Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring and the nutrition books of Adelle Davis, which prompted widespread concern about food processing, the American public was soon confronted by growing disquiet regarding egg consumption and its relation to heart disease.
In 1968, a group of food scientists decided to devise a safe cholesterol standard to heed the concerns of food moralists and their constituents. After much debate, writes Gina Mallet in Last Chance to Eat: The Fate for Taste in a Fast Free World, the scientists arbitrarily set a limit: because people consumed an average of 580mg of cholesterol a day (per litre of blood), they decided they should half it. This was how the 300mg per day dietary cholesterol standard came into being.
According to Dr Donald J. McNamara, executive director of the Egg Nutrition Centre, “There’s not one bit of scientific evaluation in that number.”
The American Heart Association then led the way in the war on eggs. With fanfare, it recommended in 1972 that individual egg consumption be limited to three eggs a week, which delivered 213mg of cholesterol.
At its nadir, individual yearly egg consumption in the US plunged in 1991 to 233 eggs per person, down from a peak of 402 eggs per person in 1945. Although scientists later determined that human cholesterol was created by the ways in which the body processed food and not by eating food that contained cholesterol, Mallet notes that a quarter of a century passed before scientists attempted to sever the link between cholesterol and heart disease.
In 1999, a National Institute of Health funded study by the Harvard School of Public Health concluded that there was no health hazard from eating eggs, prompting the AHA to at least revise upward the recommended number of eggs per week to four, and later to an egg a day.
The egg controversy was but one attempt of confused scientists, the food industry and nutritionists to regulate nutrition, many of which merely blew their reputations and confused the public. Eating fiber was supposed to stave off colon cancer, but it didn’t. The most notorious of all was that margarine was a healthy and cheap substitute for butter, in spite of its unpleasant taste and uncanny ability to ruin any dish you cooked it with. Food scientists later discovered that margarine was dripping with trans fat, the deadliest of all fats. Thirty years of official nutritional advice, says food writer Michael Pollan, has only made Americans sicker and fatter, while ruining countless numbers of meals.
Cholesterol is the most common steroid in the body, and is essential to the formation of cell walls, bile acid (a digestive aid for fats) and production of Vitamin D. There are two types of cholesterol. The first is dietary cholesterol found in meats, seafood, eggs and dairy products. The second is blood cholesterol (or serum cholesterol), which is produced in the liver.
Of the two types of blood cholesterol – High Density Lipoprotein (HDL) and Low Density Lipoprotein (LDL) – LDL is the “bad” type, because it sticks to the artery walls. Hence too much of it can increase the possibility of coronary artery disease. The ambiguity lies in the extent to which dietary cholesterol contributes to elevated blood cholesterol.
Mimi Sham, a Canadian-registered dietician at Hong Kong’s Mimi Sham Dietician clinic says, “Studies have observed [that] dietary intake of excessive cholesterol is linked to high blood cholesterol levels, though it is not the only factor affecting it [blood cholesterol]. A diet high in cholesterol is probably high in saturated fats and total fat,” elements that are not readily found in eggs.
Of the three types of fats – saturated, monounsaturated and polyunsaturated – saturated fats pose the greatest risk of elevating your blood cholesterol and LDL levels. Consuming those fats “leads to a derangement of your cholesterol profile,” says Sham.
Despite the lack of evidence that links egg consumption with heart disease, the American Heart Association and Recommended Dietary Allowance have still not revised their cholesterol intake numbers.
Disagreements between pro-egg and anti-egg camps in the nutritional science field stem from an uncertainty over the numerous factors that control the level of blood cholesterol – chemical processes not entirely understood by cardiologists, lipid experts or dieticians. No studies have evaluated or quantified how exercise can maintain dietary cholesterol levels in the body, nor do doctors fully understand how genetic inheritance affects the body’s ability to maintain blood cholesterol levels. This confusion explains why, despite the most recent findings dispelling the myth of eggs, cholesterol and its relation to heart disease, institutions like the AHA and RCD have still left the 300mg standard untouched.
If you have high blood cholesterol levels, it is most probably because you’re eating a diet plagued by poor quality fats – eggs are not the culprits. Your genetic make-up also factors into the calculation. But limiting your dietary intake of saturated-fatty foods is only part of a more holistic approach to sustaining a healthy lifestyle. Regular exercise and weight loss are equally essential components that can help reduce your blood cholesterol levels.
Eggs consist of mostly polyunsaturated fat. An egg also contains 13 important vitamins (like A, D and E) and minerals (like zinc, calcium and iron), high-quality protein and antioxidants. For only 70 calories!
In 2007, the Medical Science Monitor found that eating eggs could be associated with a reduction in blood pressure, and that egg consumption contributed to less than 1 percent of the risk for heart disease.
The time has come for eggs to reclaim their place on the breakfast, lunch and dinner tables.
Infinite variety
There is something noble about the simplicity of an egg. Its texture is varied and luxurious, and the increasing availability of ultra-fresh varieties only heightens its low-cost appeal. Here are some recipes to try now that we have conquered our fear of eggs
French Scrambled Eggs with Chives, Chervil and Shaved Truffles
2 tbsp butter
4 eggs, separated
1 tspn fresh chives, minced
1 tspn fresh chervil, minced
Salt and pepper
Black truffles
Whisk egg yolks until just incorporated.
Melt 1 tablespoon of butter in saucepan over medium heat until brown. Do not let butter burn.
Pour in whites and whisk until little white specks appear, 30 seconds to one minute.
Pour in yolks and continue to whisk until eggs are cooked and take on a silky, creamy consistency, around two minutes.
When eggs are done, take off the heat and mix in remaining tablespoon of butter. Season with salt and pepper to taste.
Add minced herbs and top with grated truffles.
Roasted Garlic Soufflé
2 heads of garlic
Olive oil
3 tbsp butter
3 tbsp all-purpose flour
1 cup milk
4 eggs yolks/5 egg whites
3/4 cups Parmigiano-Reggiano
1/2 tspn fresh rosemary, minced
1/2 tspn cayenne
1/2 tspn grated nutmeg
1 cup Gruyere cheese
1/8 teaspoon cream of tartar
Salt and Pepper
Preheat oven to 200C (400F).
Slice off tops of garlic, drizzle olive oil on top. Wrap in foil and bake in oven until soft, 40-50 minutes. When cool, squeeze out garlic cloves, add a little salt and reduce in a mortar to a paste.
Make roux. Melt 3 tablespoons of butter in a saucepan, then remove from heat and whisk in flour. Return pan to low heat and whisk constantly, three minutes.
Slowly pour milk into roux, whisking constantly. Bring to a boil, then simmer for three minutes, continuing to whisk. Remove from heat and whisk in yolks one at a time. Whisk in garlic paste, Parmigiano-Reggiano, grated nutmeg, cayenne and half of the rosemary. Add salt and pepper, then remove from heat. Transfer to bowl.
Beat egg whites with a pinch of salt and cream of tartar until they form stiff peaks.
With a spatula, fold a third of the whites into the hot Béchamel mixture. Fold in Gruyere, then remaining whites, and sprinkle with remaining rosemary.
Butter and flour a gratin dish or six individual ramekins.
Bake soufflé until set and brown on top, 25-30 minutes.
Cherry and Almond Clafoutis
Traditionally, the French leave the pits of the cherries in. You can pit them if you’d like, but I prefer the rustic approach. Be sure to warn your guests!
500g cherries
1/2 cup blanched almonds
1/3 cup granulated sugar
4 eggs
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 tspn salt
2 cups milk
1 tbsp almond or vanilla extract
1/2 tspn lemon zest
2 tbsp Armagnac or Kirsch
Powdered sugar
Preheat oven to 190C (375F).
Lay cherries and almonds in cast-iron or round baking pan, 25-28cm.
In a bowl, beat granulated sugar and eggs with an electric mixer over high speed until light and fluffy, 2-3 minutes.
Mix in flour and salt.
Add milk, almond extract, lemon zest and 1 tablespoon kirsch and mix until just incorporated.
Pour batter onto the cherries and almonds in the pan and pour remaining tablespoon of kirsch on top.
Bake for 40 minutes. Check with tester to ensure batter is cooked before removing from oven.
Let clafoutis cool, then sift powdered sugar on top. Clafoutis can be eaten hot, cold or at room temperature.
