My hens bring me joy. Sometimes I lounge in the yard with a plan to read a book, and then spend the hour watching chickens dodder by, top-heavy, clueless, burbling like a slow stream. They bring me laughter and peace, and every day, warm and smooth round gifts. We love to give our ladies oats and millet seed and fresh lettuce and vegetable scraps. They give us compost to feed our garden plants. Endlessly they scratch and stir up the clay into a bed softer than our ocean floor New Orleanian soil every knew it could be.
I recommend backyard free-range chickens to all, but for those who can’t host a small flock, the next best thing is to support and buy eggs from those who respect and love their chickens as much as we do—Nellie’s Free Range Eggs love their chickens.
Eggs that issue from happy, healthy and free chickens are actually more healthy for you. So many ways to enjoy! Hardboil and take with you to work as a snack! Frittata!
Bake them into Whoopie Pies while cheering on your favorite SEC Football team!
S’More Whoopie Pies
Adapted from the Southern Living All-New Official SEC Tailgating Cookbook
½ cup salted butter, softened
1 cup granulated sugar
3 large Nellie’s eggs, room temp
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 cups all purpose flour
1 tsp baking powder
½ tsp baking soda
½ tsp salt
¼ cup whole milk
Whoopie pie filling (I just made meringue with four egg whites whipped with a sprinkle of cream of tartar and ¼ cup powdered sugar)
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Combine butter and sugar in the bowl of a stand mixer and beat until well blended, 3 min. Add eggs, one at a time. Then vanilla. Stir all the dry ingredients in a bowl separately, then add the dry to the mixer interchanged with the milk in two-three additions. Scoop a dollop of the batter onto a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Bake at 400 until they are set and just beginning to brown, about 8 minutes. Cool the cookies on racks until totally cool. Put the filling on one side, and make a delicious whoopie pie sandwich! With the meringue filling, you can torch it to make it like a toasted marshmallow. We dipped ours in fondue chocolate left over from our chocolate fountain and created a S’more-like Whoopie Pie experience. But in the SEC Cookbook, you will see how each university team has their own signature pie recipe. Also tons of recipes for different chilis and nachos.
I’ve also always loved to use eggs for French Toast. This collection of toaster oven recipes by Linda Stephen has a great French toast recipe we used to get ourselves up and pumped to vote on Election Day this last week. I will now always coat my French toast in oats with cinnamon. Delicious.
This post is sponsored by Nellie’s Free Range Eggs. But opinions and genuine chicken love, my own.