Posted on 03/28/2013 4:05:31 PM PDT by Daffynition
In this season of beitzahs and PAAS dye kits, it may be time for a friendly reminder about hard-boiled eggs: You’re not actually supposed to boil them. Hard-boiled eggs may seem too basic to warrant a PSA, but misinformation abounds. Just the other day, a bright, culinarily astute friend casually mentioned his egg-boiling technique, which he described as “traditional,” and which he seemed to think was socially condoned: Bring a pot of water to a low boil, add your eggs, and cook them for 10 minutes over medium heat.
Granted, his mistake is understandable—the very name “hard-boiled eggs” cruelly and ironically perpetuates the myth that the thing they describe should be boiled. But following my friend’s method yields unevenly cooked eggs: The whites, battered by the incessant kinetic energy of the water molecules, become tough and rubbery. The yolks, meanwhile, buffered by albumin, remain half raw. (Of course, you could boil the eggs longer than 10 minutes to get fully cooked yolks, but by that point your whites would have the texture of a foam yoga mat.) Eggs cooked this way cannot rightfully be called hard-boiled—they are half-hard, half-soft chimeras.
Furthermore, cooking eggs in boiling water disturbs whatever domestic tranquility you have carefully cultivated in your kitchen. Boiling eggs will rattle disquietingly in the pot, jarring your nerves (which may already be tattered either by Easter Bunny-crazed children or by not having been able to eat bread for several days). You might as well put on Steve Reich’s Drumming. In addition to being an aural nightmare, clattering eggs are liable to crack, thereby defeating the purpose of cooking them in the shell in the first place, and ruining them as a clean slate for dying or charring.
(Excerpt) Read more at slate.com ...
Fool Proof Soft Boiled Eggs:
Eggs right from the fridge.
In pot with cold water to cover
Bring to a soft boil
Exactly 2 1/2 minutes!!! 2.75 if extra large.
Remove from heat, cool down in running cool water.
Perfect.
Start with cold water. Place eggs in pan and bring to a boil. Turn off heat and let sit for 12 minutes. Perfect and they peel super easy.
Woody Woodpecker and Wally Walrus. Wow, it’s been a year or two.
Hard boiled eggs:
Bring eggs to a rolling boil. Take them off the heat and let them set for 22 minutes in the water and covered pan. When time is up, pour out warm water and fill with cold water a few times until eggs are cool to touch. Tap egg on edge of counter, or table, roll slightly between palms, and remove shell starting at the wide end.
My middle son did this. With ensuing explosion, I thought we had our own personal meteorite.
Eggs in shell + microwave = rolls of paper towel and much Windex.
Today we decided to try blowing out some eggs with a pump and ball needle - if the yolk blocks the hole don’t keep pumping, because it blows the egg in half.
(Then I swing them around over my head in an old T-shirt my wife got from someone.)
Since I’ve retired from teaching English to recalcitrant high schoolers, I’ve been teaching cooking classes as a part-time job.
Fool proof hard boiled eggs:
Place eggs in a heavy saucepot. Fill with cold water to at least an inch above the eggs. Bring to a boil. Immediately cover pot and remove from heat. Let sit until room tempeature.
They will be perfect with no dark rings around the yolk.
Peel under cold running water.
I read about a woman who had a family recipe, handed down for three generations. The recipe was for for cooking a ham. Part of the procedure was to carefully trim the ends of the ham. This was considered a vital step, not to be omitted. One day somebody asked Great Grandma what exactly did that part of the recipe add to the outcome. She informed them that when she was a young wife, her largest roasting pan was rather small, so she had to trim the ends to make the ham fit.
“Dis time I’m gonna take care of dat voodpecker once and for good!”
My MIL’s recipe: bring eggs to boil then turn off heat & allow to cool about 20 min. When cool enough to peel, perfectamundo!
Oops!
Apparantly not, so here it is. Works every time and has worked for, doubtless, centuries.
Dissolve 1 TBSP salt per quart of water prior to heating the water. Boil as usual. When boiled for your preferred length of time (I like 17 minutes on high heat, adding eggs gently ONLY after water begins boiling; YMMV, esp. at different altitudes), drain the pot halfway and, using tongs or a large slotted spoon, remove the eggs gently into a cold-water bath. Using ice-water is fine, but it is overkill. Let stand for 15-20 minutes once removed to the cold-water bath.
If these eggs do not peel perfectly every time, I will apologise very humbly, right here (well, bar the case where someone smashes the eggs instead of tapping them two or three times and peeling using both thumbs). You should never see a 'chipped' hard-boiled egg again.
Best regards...
if that happens, poke the yolk and keep puffing
Joe you are awesome
Actually, just holding them under cold tap water is sufficient to cause the steam produced, to force the shell and membrane to dislodge from around the egg thereby enabling an easy shell removal. I do this at least once a week so I know it works, every time.
BANG!
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