Peggs (made from chickpeas, not chicks!)
Peggs are made by chickpeas, instead of chicks! This food brand was born during the pandemic, when the founders wished to make omelettes and French toast, but could not buy eggs. The chickpeas are combined with cheesy-tasting nutritional yeast and sulphur-smelling black salt, for a realistic alternative that’s shelf-stable.
Before cooking, read our post on food safety for people and pets. If buying egg alternatives, recycle packaging at supermarket bag bins, if your kerbside doesn’t recycle.
Why Would Anyone Eat Vegan Eggs?
Of course, we all know that the only ‘ethical egg’ is certified free-range from local farms. So if you do eat eggs, then go for ones from a farmer you know, or look for ‘certified free-range’ on labels, anything else is greenwash.
If you have rescued chickens or buy from a friendly local farmer, it’s likely the chicks are okay. But in the commercial world, most male chicks are gassed at birth, as they are of no financial use (the egg industry is different to the broiler industry for chicken meat). Norway has just banned this practice.
So in a nutshell, that’s why vegans don’t eat eggs, because they don’t want to contribute to lots of male chicks being killed. Older hens also sometimes get killed at the end of their laying lives too.
Commercial farming tends to rush when sexing chicks, so sometimes they get mixed up. This is what happened when one woman bought three duck eggs (presumed unfertilised) from Waitrose. But they hatched (thankfully she knew what she was doing). She named them Beep, Peep & Meep!
The main issue in England is battery eggs (all bar Farm Foods have undertaken a voluntary ban on selling them). But greenwash labels like ‘cage-free’ or ‘barn eggs’ simply means they have a teeny bit more space, but still suffer de-beaking, lack of foraging areas and stress that leads to aggression.
Also the supermarkets have only banned the selling of ‘eggs’. They don’t ban the sale of food brands that use battery eggs, which rather defeats the point (again putting profits above welfare). Catering firms also tend to buy battery eggs, for cost reasons due to using so many.
Queen guitarist (and badger campaigner) Brian May recently resigned from his role as vice-president of the RSPCA. Although it does wonderful work for emergency rescue, its ‘welfare-assured’ scheme has many issues.
One egg farm that supplies to Tesco and M & S was found to have ‘free-range hens’ that had no access to outdoor space (one was even found hanging upside down, trying to escape faulty equipment).
Of course the supermarkets are always appalled. But when you have mass suppliers, this happens. So a good reason to pop to the farmers’ market, and buy free-range eggs from a farmer you trust.
Certified free-range eggs at least guarantee access to outdoor space, a bigger area to live in, and are only given antibiotics as medicine, not just ‘to stop disease on factory farms’.
