PREPARATION OP FROZEN AND DRIED EGGS, 55 



supervise the work of the candlers and the grading of the breakers as well as to instill 

 the fundamentals of bacterial cleanliness into the people cleaning the apparatus. 



A dairy sterilizer had been installed and it was found that 20 minutes at 210° F. waa 

 sufficient to render cups, cans, and breaking knives sterile. All apparatus coming in 

 contact with the egg was, therefore, subjected to this treatment. The churn in which 

 the eggs were mixed and the pails in which the liquid egg was collected were steril- 

 ized at noon and again at night to be in readiness for the work of the next morning, 



It was observed that many of the eggs had very weak yolks and some had cloudy 

 whites, but the greatest number of rejects were broken-down blood rings. These eggs 

 were difficult to grade and were in such large proportion that the breakers became lax 

 in grading, as stated before. Utensils were clean, but the hands of the breakers were 

 wet and their manipulation of the egg was not exact. 



The samples in the first section of Table 25 were taken when the conditions just 

 described prevailed. The ammoniacal nitrogen was not high and the bacterial count 

 varied from 650,000 per gram in the white to 2,300,000 in the yolk. It seemed de- 

 sirable, however, to investigate the influence on the bacterial count of more careful 

 grading in the breaking room. Samples Nos. 652 to 654, inclusive, show that care in this 

 quarter alone is not enough if there is poor grading in the candling room, as the counts 

 still varied from 220,000 in the white to 1,800,000 in the mixed egg. Three girls 

 were then instructed to handle the eggs in the usual fashion, but to be exceedingly 

 careful to eliminate every doubtful egg and to replace soiled with clean apparatus 

 whenever an egg was discarded — a precaution which had sometimes been neglected 

 because of the number of discards. The work of each of these girls was tested sepa- 

 rately. The number of bacteria in the product prepared by them was low, as is 

 evidenced in samples Nos. 661 to 666, inclusive, the counts exceeding 1,000 per gram 

 in only two cases, and these not exceeding 310,000. 



Later in the same day the supply of eggs coming from the candling room was plen- 

 tifully sprinkled with undesirable eggs — stuck spots, broken yolks, disintegrated 

 blood rings, etc. With such a supply two of the girls were instructed to handle the 

 eggs as accurately as possible, cracking sharply, turning quickly to prevent leakage, 

 emptying shells neatly, and keeping fingers clean and dry by means of tissue paper. 

 The results are given in samples Nos. 668 to 671, inclusive. The counts are high; in 

 fact, that of 18,000,000 in the white is far beyond any other count in the whole series 

 and can not be explained by any observed condition. With a better class of eggs, 

 though the work of the candlers was still unsatisfactory, samples of yolk, white, and 

 mixed egg, handled in as cleanly a manner as the girls were capable of, gave the 

 results shown by samples Nos. 672 to 674, inclusive, the mixed egg running up to 

 1,700,000 bacteria per gram. 



Closer attention to grading in the breaking room resulted in the elimination from the 

 output of the house of many eggs that were considered "doubtful." They were col- 

 lected in a clean pail and examined. Samples Nos. 656, 679, 680, and 681 show that 

 the number of bacteria was, in all but sample No. 680, decidedly above that usually 

 observed, varying from 1,600,000 to 19,000,000. The loosely bound nitrogen was not 

 high. The eggs going to make up these samples had soft yolks, disintegrated and 

 bleached blood rings, milky whites, yolks so heavily settled that they were almost 

 adherent, and almost all of them showed evidences of having had wet shells. The 

 hot, humid weather, and eggs from stolen nests would seem sufficient reasons to ac- 

 count for the presence of these deteriorated eggs and their number. 



Improvement on the part of the candlers was now demanded. Their first efforts, 

 supplemented by careful grading and handling in the breaking room, were encour- 

 aging, as indicated by samples Nos. 675 to 678, inclusive, where the output of only 

 one breaker contained enough organisms to be worthy of consideration, that is, 2,200,- 

 000 per gram, the others varying from less than 1.000 to 64,000. 



Still more exactness on the part of the candlers, as well as better receipts, and the 

 same care, with the better work that practice in the cleanly way of holding the egg 

 gave to the breakers, yielded the output samples in the series Nos. 682 to 690. The 

 total number of organisms was reduced to less than 1,000 per gram, except in two 

 specimens; the organisms of the coli group were almost eliminated. The breakers 

 worked steadily and rapidly. With the better grading in the candling room the loss 

 of time, due to changing soiled for clean apparatus, washing hands, etc., was saved, 

 and the judgment of the breaker when accepting an egg as satisfactory was more 

 trustworthy. 



