HONOLULU (Island News) — Hideki Yamada is the owner of Japanese restaurant Kokoro-Tei, struggling to get his hands on eggs for his popular oyako don.
“It’s really hard to purchase the eggs from the vendor so I went to Costco and then Sam’s Club as well,” he said. “There’s empty shelves. I went to there early in the morning when they open and I enter the store, but there were no eggs over there.”
The grocery staple has been in short supply and high demand for the past couple years due to the ongoing bird flu that has decimated millions of hens across the country.
When he’s able to find eggs, the cost has doubled and sometimes tripled making it unaffordable for his small business.
The Consumer Price Index shows year-over-year egg prices jumped almost 40% late last year.
“Normally, cost would be 25¢ or something like that,” Yamada said. “But now it’s about $1 or over $1 sometimes.”
And it’s only getting worse.
“The price is so increasing, so it’s really hard to purchase and to provide our customers the same price,” Yamada added.
Grocery stores like Safeway are also alerting customers this week about the shortage.
“That’s a terrible thing,” Yamada said. “We’re worried about it but we have to wait until the situation is going to change and then have a stable supply.”
With the roughly 800 eggs he needs every week for his dishes, he’s hoping to ride out the eggs-tremely difficult times.
Dining and Cooking