Crack open an egg from Mullion Creek Farm and you'll notice something immediately. The yolk sits tall — a deep golden dome, not a flat pale disc. The white holds its shape around it rather than spreading across the pan like water. That's not an accident, and it's not aesthetics. It's information.
The yolk tells you what the hen ate.
A pale, washed-out yellow yolk is the product of a hen fed on a grain-heavy diet with little access to pasture, insects, or green matter. Colour in a yolk comes primarily from carotenoids — pigments found naturally in grasses, bugs, and plants that pasture-raised hens consume as part of a varied diet. When hens eat well, the yolk is rich and golden. It's that simple.
What's less simple — and worth knowing — is that this relationship between diet and yolk colour has been exploited by commercial egg producers for decades. Synthetic carotenoids and feed additives like canthaxanthin or beta-apo-8-carotenal are added to grain-based feeds specifically to make pale yolks appear orange. The chickens aren't healthier. The eggs aren't more nutritious. The colour is manufactured, and the yolk colour chart — a laminated shade guide literally used by some commercial producers to hit a colour target — exists for marketing purposes, not animal welfare.
Mullion Creek Farm takes a different approach. They pay 30–40% more for GMO-free feed that contains no synthetic dyes or artificial colourants. That's a meaningful cost premium absorbed by the farm because they believe what goes into the feed goes into the chicken, and what goes into the chicken goes into the egg, and ultimately into you and your family. Less chemical load on the bird means less chemical load on the customer. It's not complicated, but it is a genuine choice that only small scale producers can make.
The egg white tells you about freshness.
A fresh egg has a thick, gel-like white that grips the yolk and holds together. As an egg ages, the proteins in the white break down — the white thins and spreads. A very fresh egg cracked into a pan will look almost sculptural. An old egg looks like it's trying to escape. This is why a floating egg in a glass of water is a sign to discard it — the air cell inside grows as the egg ages and moisture evaporates through the shell.
Mullion Creek Farm eggs come to you within 1-3 days of laying. There's no warehouse, no extended cold chain, no weeks of transit. That matters to the texture of your scrambled eggs, the height of your soufflé, and the integrity of your poached egg. Freshness isn't a marketing word here — it's measurable, visible, and edible.
Next time you crack an egg, have a look before you cook it. A tall golden yolk and a tight white are the mark of an egg that had a good life and a short journey. At YourMarket, that's exactly what we're delivering.