I'm surprised that no-one has mentioned that Avidin is only found in the egg whites and is a one-one biotin blocker. Biotin is found in the yolks.

If you eat the uncooked eggwhites alone, it will block biotin from other sources (like liver) as well.

Avidin is a glycoprotein found in raw egg white. It combines stoichiometrically with biotin. The toxic effect of uncooked egg white which causes a syndrome similar to that of vitamin B deficiency (Boaz 1924) led to the discovery of the vitamin biotin (Gyorgy 1931, 1939). The toxic factor, first isolated by Eakin et al. (1940, 1941) who named it avidin, combines with the essential growth factor resulting in a "non-digestible" avidin-biotin complex which is not absorbed from the intestine or from the surrounding medium by microorganisms. Avidin plays an important role in biotin function studies and in the study of several enzymes in which biotin is a coenzyme. Avidin or avidin subunits bound to a matrix have been utilized for affinity purification (Berger and Wood, 1975; Green and Toms, 1973).

You Really Need Biotin to be bioavailable, so avoid uncooked egg whites.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avidin

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biotin

WHY YOU NEED BIOTIN FROM http://lpi.oregonstate.edu/infocenter/vitamins/biotin/

Biotin activates carboxylases!

Each carboxylase catalyzes an essential metabolic reaction:

• Acetyl-CoA carboxylase I and II catalyze the binding of bicarbonate to acetyl-CoA to form malonyl-CoA. Malonyl-CoA is required for the synthesis of fatty acids. The former is crucial in cytosolic fatty acid synthesis, and the latter functions in regulating mitochondrial fatty acid oxidation.
• Pyruvate carboxylase is a critical enzyme in gluconeogenesis—the formation of glucose from sources other than carbohydrates, for example, amino acids.
• Methylcrotonyl-CoA carboxylase catalyzes an essential step in the catabolism of leucine, an essential amino acid.
• Propionyl-CoA carboxylase catalyzes essential steps in the metabolism of certain amino acids, cholesterol, and odd chain fatty acids (fatty acids with an odd number of carbon molecules).

When I do eat raw eggs, I'm just eating the yolk. YUMMY! Part of Mayo is very good for you.

Just make sure that they are free-range/organic to make sure you have lowered your salmonella chances.

If you mix them with very dark chocolate to make chocolate mousse, they are worth eating raw! ;)

It probably sounds gross to most people, but what I like to do is seperate a few yolks (usually four) into a bowl. At the same time I will fry up some onions, peppers, and maybe some left over meat or a couple chunks of potato. Once all of that has been cooked through I will dump the pan, butter and all into the bowl of egg yolks and stir. This will usually warm the yolks to the consistency of over easy egg yolk. Tastes awesome but you will get looks!

I've been eating raw eggs for several years (from a trusted local farm). I add 2-4 of them to a raw goat milk-coconut milk shake I make in the morning. I seperate out the whites due to the biotin thing, although I've read that you'd have to eat like a dozen for that to have any negative effect... If I cook them I do it over easy, runny yolk in either bacon fat, tallow or coconut oil...

I can see the rationale for eating the yolks raw. With egg whites there seems little scope for benefit, only disadvantages. The whites contain virtually no micronutrients anyway (apart from a bit of selenium and riboflavin), just protein, which you'd be less able to utilise anyway were it uncooked. Also some people seem to be intolerant to egg whites, a problem which is mitigated when the whites are cooked.

The CDC estimates that 1 in 20,000 uncooked eggs carries salmonella. The disease is supposedly transmitted directly from the hen before the egg is fully formed. That's not a lot of eggs but if you eat at a restaurant where hundreds of eggs are cracked together and mixed and then used for something in which they are not fully cooked, then your chances of exposure go way up. All that being said, raw eggs mixed into a batter of nut butter and bananas is delicious and I will surely continue to lick the bowl as the rest of the batter is cooking. But I will also continue to cook the rest of my eggs. I have never seen any research that raw eggs are better for you and personally I think in most cases they taste much better cooked. Plus some research suggests that cooking lessens levels of avidin by up to 70% (for frying) and enhances digestiblity. http://www.cholesterol-and-health.com/Egg_Yolk.html Biotin deficiency is rare so temporarily impaired absorption is probably not a big deal unless you eat tons of eggs, but since I like my eggs cooked anyway, I see no reason to make a special effort to eat them raw.

I ate my first raw egg yolk. It tasted like....egg yolk. What a surprise! lol.

An earlier commenter said it sounded disgusting but it really wasn't. I'm not wowed by the taste but it wasn't bad. I think what probably makes it taste bad is if you leave the egg white in there. Drain the egg white out...

Anyway, in answer to the original question, it is worth trying at least once (but not with a conventional egg) if you feel that adventurous.

Cooking an egg in Bacon fat makes for my absolute favorite Saturday treat.

That being said, Organic pastured eggs are fine as long as you don't have an egg allergy.

Alot of raw carnivores eat several a day and maintain excellent health.

Alot of great nutrients in raw egg yolk. K2 is only one of the big players

I've heard raw egg yolk described as having a "pleasant" taste. They were talking about the yolk not the albumen. I don't know I haven't tried that yet. If I were to eat a raw egg it would definitely not be a conventional egg. Cage free at least...

Personally I would not eat raw eggs even if it was advisable to do so. Cooked eggs are delicious, raw ones are disgusting. I see no point in eating something that is not enjoyable with all of the options we have.

Raw eggs are lovely. I mix 3 organic eggs into a pint of raw organic milk. That's my breakfast. Why separate the white from the yoke? Nature doesn't make mistakes, mankind does. If the body doesn't use it , it will waste it. Why fuss over separating them? Just get them down you.

I wouldn't eat them based on this, but one benefit to raw egg is that raw egg protein (mostly in the egg white) upregulates glutathione in otherwise protein-replete people, in similar fashion to whey protein.

Another question: Is there such a thing as eating TOO many eggs? I counted how many eggs my partner and I ate one day and came up with 4 each...apart from limiting the variety of our diet is this bad?

I used to just eat eggs for protein [vegetarian gf] but got tired of cooking them in the morning so I just drank them with some tasty olive oil, and ate an apple or two.
I LOVE the idea of putting egg yolks in a shake. I'm going to have to try that for sure! Hey, probably better than whey, too

heard some where that if you drink the egg down straight (both the white and yoke) without breaking the yoke then there is no chance of geting a biotin deficinty becouse they digest at different rates if the yoke is whole.... anyone know how true this is???

Well I just tried my first raw egg, didn't taste it at all! I mixed it into our nutritional shake mix with a dash of cocoa, almond milk, and 1 tbls almond butter. Liking the 45g of protein!!

I drink up to 30 raw eggs a day and I've lost fat and gained muscle. Love it