Britons waste hundreds of millions of eggs

Overcautious Britons threw away more than 720 million eggs last year mainly because of stringency about "best-before" dates.

According to consumer research from the company behind the food waste app Too Good To Go, the waste has grown three times compared to 2008 and at a cost of 139 million pounds ($182 million) a year.

The research, published on Tuesday, shows about one in three people rely on "best before" dates, and that the growing popularity of vegetarian and "flexitarian" diets has boosted overall sales.

The Food Standards Agency suggested that eggs can be safely eaten up to two days past the date stated, provided that they are cooked to the point that the yolk and white are solid.

EU legislation requires that the maximum "best before" date on eggs must be 28 days from when they were laid. However, eggs are often good long after that.

The food agency said that apart from eggs, most foods can be eaten safely after the "best before" date, as this is mostly about quality rather than safety.

"Past this date it doesn't mean that the food will be harmful, rather that its flavor, color or texture might begin to deteriorate," a statement said.

Britons ate 13 billion eggs last year, a rise of 2 percent from 2017, 11 billion of which were domestically produced, according to UK Egg Industry Data provided by the government. It means the average person eats almost 200 eggs per year.

Experts suggest that we can check an egg by placing it in a bowl of water instead of looking at the "best before" date.

If eggs sink to the bottom and lay flat on their sides, they're very fresh. If they're less fresh but still good to eat, they'll stand on one end at the bottom of the bowl. If they float to the surface, they're no longer fresh enough to eat.

"If you've been throwing your eggs in the bin based on the dates on the box, you've probably been wasting perfectly good food," said Jamie Crummie, a co-founder of Too Good To Go.

"Food waste is a huge problem – a third of all food produced globally is wasted. Small changes from each of us can make a big difference," he said.

Each year, more than 10 million tons of food is thrown away, according to the organization. The waste is estimated to be worth 17 billion pounds. That's 700 pounds per family per year spent on food that ultimately ends up in the rubbish bin.

Too Good To Go is encouraging the British public to use the so-called water bowl test to check the freshness of their eggs and help cut down on edible food being needlessly binned.

Research by Wrap, the government's waste advisory body, suggests one in five people in the United Kingdom don't know that it is possible to freeze eggs to use later.