Why Eggs Are Expensive Right Now—and What to Cook Instead

glamour.com:

might be . But if you’ve taken a scroll online in the past week, you already know the bad news: Eggs, the , are still doggedly expensive.

By the end of last year, a dozen would set you back —120% higher than the same time in 2021. That figure doesn’t reflect the reality in states like California, the most expensive US market, where shoppers were paying  for 12 large Grade A eggs in December.

Social media, of course, is a flood of angst. It’s all empty shelf pictures, angry comments lobbed at egg-centric TikTok recipe developers, distressed memes, and utter disbelief at the highest egg prices in US history.Here’s what you need to know about the price of eggs, and, importantly, what the heck home cooks can do about it.

are partially to blame. But by far the biggest culprit is disease. The worst-ever outbreak of highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI), which  in the US in February last year, has resulted in the deaths of more than , according to the Agriculture Department. “The flu is the most important factor affecting egg prices,” Maro Ibarburu, a business analyst at the Egg Industry Center at Iowa State University, told The Washington Post.The virus is terrible for the infected birds, , according to the CDC.