The record is nine, I believe.

Double yolks occur when two ova pass through the reproductive tract at about the same time, and get encased in the same shell. It happens when the synchronisation of the reproductive system is a little off, as can happen in hens that are very young or very old. It happens around 1 in a 1000 times.

They're not identical twins- I guess you'd call them fraternal twins. It's possible for both to hatch if fertilized, but usually one out-competes the other and only one survives.

Perfectly safe to eat, and is even a sign of good luck. They often wind up several to a carton as eggs are generally sorted according to size, and double-yolk eggs tend to be larger.

Several years ago I had a carton that had 8 or 9 doubles in it. Weird, it was. Never saw another one before or since.

quote:

Originally posted by egregore:

I actually had a vegan girlfriend say that to me in college....

Got a dozen eggs from a local farmer’s market several years ago and the seller said there was a strong chance of some being double yolks. I thought that was likely due to the chicken’s genetics (twins run in families you know), but have learned here today that is not really the case. Sure enough, 4 or 5 did have double yolks. They were, of course, delicious. Haven’t seen any since.

We have had chickens in the past. They laid quite a few eggs with double yokes. This past April we again got some baby chicks and are waiting for them to start laying. I'll be curious to see if any of them lay eggs with double yokes.

My daughter has a rooster that laid over six dozen chickens.

quote:

My daughter has a rooster that laid over six dozen chickens.

Yeah, but don't take the rooster's word for it - you know they crow a lot! (Come to think of it, that applies to men, too!)

There was a guy that sold eggs on my way home, I'm not a big egg eater, but ever two or three weeks I would stop by and buy a dozen or dozen and a half. Usually there would be at least two double yoke eggs.

One time I stopped and bought 18 eggs and he doubled that, for 36 eggs! I told him that I didn't want that many, but he said take em anyways.

Everyone of the eggs was double yoked, except two. One was a triple a the other a quad yoked egg!

That was three years ago, and shortly after he stopped selling eggs and I haven't seen a double yoked egg since!

ARman

Never seen a triple, but doubles are relatively common. Had one last week, tasted great!

Bob

quote:

Originally posted by V-Tail:
The grocery store where I buy eggs has large, extra large, and jumbo eggs. I have never found a double yolk in the large or extra large, but I do find them from time to time in the jumbos.

When I lived in Can-eh-duh, I always bought the jumbo eggs. During thise 2 years, I had more double yolks than the rest of my life combined. At one point, the last few yolks of a dozen were double yolks and the entire next dozen were double yolks.

I got 3 double yolks in one carton of 18. Never even one before or after.

Chinese Chicken

When I was just a bachelor just out of high school, The second egg out of the dozen had a dead chick inside. I freaked out. Called a relative on my rotary dial wired phone to ask if this is normal. They said toss the whole dozen as they might not have been from a good source to end up like that.

From a normal large egg carton, I only ever seen one double in my lifetime. It was good.

At the farmers market, I had seen a dozen being sold as "Double Yolked".

As a teen I worked at an egg farm. Double yoke eggs are quite common. In the packing shed, there was a machine that "looked" through the egg and sorted out the multiple yoke eggs. They would go to prepared egg products, like carton eggs. McDonalds used a lot. As to why so many are showing up at the grocery store, I have no idea.

The real interesting eggs were the ones laid with no shells. It was just a membrane egg that looked like a little egg water ballon. Great fun for a teenager in a henhouse with 100,000 birds and other teens for targets.