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Why eating raw egg whites even from high-quality eggs is not a good idea despite the fact that consuming fresh, free-range yolks is a safe and healthy practice.
A common question from people who enjoy the superior nutrition of eggs on a regular basis is whether raw egg whites are safe to eat.
I posted a smoothie recipe that garnered several comments about this, so I thought I’d take a few words to answer.
Of course, I’m not talking about Egg Beaters or liquid egg whites from the store. Rather, this article is about whether the egg white from a real egg is healthy or even safe to consume without cooking.
It’s not really a matter of what is safe versus not safe … the entire egg is “safe” to eat raw if you obtain quality eggs. It is best to avoid eating commercial eggs raw due to the unsanitary conditions and crowded production methods that confined chickens are subjected to which increases salmonella risk.
The real question is whether egg whites are healthy to consume raw.
The egg yolk is a wonderful way to get healthy, unprocessed fats into the diet. Yolks from duck and goose eggs included! Loaded with enzymes along with brain-boosting and nervous system calming omega-3 fatty acids when chickens run free to peck for insects and grubs, raw egg yolks are healthy to use in smoothies, eggnog, ice cream, and other uncooked foods.
They, of course, are also healthy cooked. My favorite recipes using lots of them at once are creme brulee or traditional Welsh Rarebit.
And no, cooking egg yolks does not oxidize the cholesterol. Only the extreme heat/pressure conditions of factory processing that creates powdered eggs can do that.
What to do, then, with all the leftover egg whites if you are making a dish that requires only yolks? Can or should you use them raw?
Anti-Nutrients in Raw Egg Whites
Most people do not realize that raw egg white contains avidin and trypsin inhibitors. Duck egg whites also contain this anti-nutrient.
Avidin blocks the digestion of biotin, one of the B vitamins. The trypsin inhibitors make digestion of the protein in the egg white more difficult.
Both of these anti-nutrients are neutralized by cooking. As a result, it is best to reserve the egg whites for cooked dishes. This same rule also applies for the pinkish or reddish egg whites that backyard chicken keepers sometimes get.
Even though raw egg whites contain anti-nutrients, the amount doesn’t compare with aquafaba. This popular vegan egg substitute made from cooked chickpea water contains dangerous substances such as saponins, which contribute to the development of leaky gut according to scientific research. What’s more, the anti-nutrients won’t go away with cooking, so avoid it!
What About Whites from Fertilized Eggs?
There is information going around that raw egg whites are safe to eat if they are from fertilized eggs.
Unfortunately, this simply is not the case!
According to Sally Fallon Morell, President of the Weston A. Price Foundation, raw whites are still very hard to digest even if the egg is fertilized.
The bottom line is that no matter whether you use organic store eggs, unwashed/fertilized eggs from the farmer’s market, or those from your own hens, you should always cook the whites before eating them.
Ways to Use and Store Uncooked Egg Whites
So, if you are adding a lot of raw yolks to your smoothies, what to do with all those leftover whites?
My favorite way to use up lots of uncooked egg whites in a hurry is to make nutrient-dense, soaked waffles or delicious high protein cookies.
If you can’t use them right away, they store well in a glass container in the refrigerator for several days until you are ready to use them up.
One other salient point. The egg yolk actually contains about 43% of the protein in the egg. (source)
So don’t worry that leaving out the egg whites from your smoothies will leave it devoid of this macronutrient.
More Information
Sarah, on saving the raw whites. When made into meringue, are they cooked enough to be healthy?
Yes, the anti-nutrients in egg whites are deactivated even by a light cooking so the low temperatures for making meringue still works fine.
Often I get lazy and put the whole raw pastured egg into my smoothies. This is a good reminder to just use the… http://t.co/oGHJqyC
maccaroons
Hi
I’ve taken this from Scott Wheeler’s blog
Jad-
One of my raw food mentors convinced me that there was more than enough biotin in raw egg yolks to compensate for this problem, and I revised my previous recommendation to say that eating whole raw eggs would not pose a problem. This idea made sense to me as many wild animals consume raw eggs with no apparent problems.
However, recently a subscriber, Dr. Sharma, PhD, who is a biochemist with Bayer, contacted me about this issue. His investigation into the matter revealed that there is not enough biotin in an egg yolk to bind to all the avidin present in the raw whites. He found that 5.7 grams of biotin are required to neutralize all the avidin found in the raw whites of an average-sized egg. There are only about 25 micrograms — or 25 millionths of a gram — of biotin in an average egg yolk. †from the mercola website.
I guess you would still be getting a lot of biotin from the raw meats as well?
Scott Wheeler
Aug 20th, 2008 at 6:16 pm
Jad, the action of the amino acid avidin binding with biotin is shown empirically in laboratory analysis.(The bond has also been shown to be beneficial for retaining muscle glycogen and dissolving biocarbons). However the body has an innate ability to properly alter any chemically identified enzyme inhibitor in eggs, allowing them to be eaten in their entirety. The empirircal evidence is presented here by none other than mother nature. Many Primal dieter’s have also eaten up to 30 eggs per day for at least 25 years and exhibit none of the symptoms associated with biotin deficiency. Conclusions based on lab analysis which arrive at contradictions when considered metaphysically should be dimissed. There is no doubting that biotin ( as with all of the B vitamin complex) is an essential nutrient. It has never been shown that the consumption of whole raw eggs can cause a deficiency of this or any other nutrient, in fact quite the contrary.
In addition, it should be fairly obvious that eating whole raw eggs cannot cause a biotin deficiency. Millions of years of evolution proves this. In Vitro, Avidin binds with Biotin. In Vivo, the yolk contains Biotin to combat this reaction and the inherent ability of the body to perform symbiotic biochemistry is primary. This is a good example of how experiments done in test tubes on isolated chemical elements bears no relation to the complexity of real life physiology.
End of quotes
it seems a lot of what is done in the petri dish/test tubes does not always quite relate or equate to what is happening in the body. So unbeknown to the scientists, at times their results are only a rough guide at best.
Keith
PS> I have great respect for Scott. He lives/walks his talk, and his living practices have proven to be spot on, so far as health benefits for his family and himself.
And great respect for your work as well, Sarah. These exchanges can benefit all to improve health and well being.
Cheers.
Thanks for posting. It is important to get these issues discussed with open minds presenting evidence from both sides.
Keith,
Could you please post Scott Wheeler’s website/blog? I would really like to check it out.
I also like what you have had to say about the :”controversy”.
While yes, scientifically it looks like egg whites should be cooked before being consumed, my common sense says it doesn’t make sense that we need to take a food and eat part of it raw and part of it cooked…..
Does this mean we should be using 2 egg yolks in your mayo recipe instead of the 1 whole egg plus one yolk?
A occasional raw egg yolk as in the mayo recipe is fine. They are certainly not dangerous as pointed out in the post. I was more referring to eating them frequently as in several a day in a smoothie for example as the protein is not absorbed well when they are consumed raw and the biotin in blocked from absorption.
I have read that the raw white binds to a vitamin(maybe biotin if I recall???) so I save for other recipes or let them go, just use yolks raw.
That is interesting about the quantity of protein in the yolk. That was something I was curious about – thanks for posting!
Are Raw Egg Whites Healthy? – The Healthy Home Economist http://t.co/gTRnaPk
I’m with you Greg. i doubt if the animals that rob the nests of birds bother to separate the yoke from the white. 🙂
Also the freezing of foods(excepting fruits) does little for the nutrient levels.
I mostly agree with Sarah, but not on this one. A bit of flawed science, or science looked at from the wrong angle.
Also I guess I’m looking at it from an all raw perspective, whereas this site does promote cooked foods as well. They don’t mix that well.
Cooked foods are not all that bad, but I feel raw is the ultimate for best health, and regeneration of the body.
Hi Keith, I certainly respect your choice to consume all your foods raw; however, few things in life are completely black and white. Eating all raw foods is certainly better than eating all cooked foods, but there is a happy medium in there somewhere as is made clear from study of traditional cultures that cooking of some foods is best for nutrient absorption and neutralization of anti-nutrients. We are not Pottenger’s Cats after all although much can be learned and put into practice from this study no doubt.
Hey Keith, Some animals *are* choosy about the parts of the animal that they eat. I’ve seen my aunts cats only eat the organ meats of some chipmunks that they caught, and WP spoke about lions being raised in captivity not being able to reproduce in captivity as in nature they usually only consume the high quality organ meats. In nature they leave the muscle flesh for jackals…. so in nature (some) animals don’t always consume all that is available to them. Sometimes they select the best and leave the rest.
My stomach absolutely does not tolerate egg whites. Probably those inhibitors you mentioned. No problem with raw yolks, and I do fine with low-and-slow cooked whole eggs.