hard-boiled egg
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Boiled eggs are
eggs Humans and human ancestors have scavenged and eaten animal eggs for millions of years. Humans in Southeast Asia had domesticated chickens and harvested their eggs for food by 1,500 BCE. The most widely consumed eggs are those of fowl, especial ...
, typically from a
chicken The chicken (''Gallus gallus domesticus'') is a domesticated junglefowl species, with attributes of wild species such as the grey and the Ceylon junglefowl that are originally from Southeastern Asia. Rooster or cock is a term for an adu ...
, cooked with their shells unbroken, usually by immersion in boiling water. Hard-boiled eggs are cooked so that the egg white and egg yolk both solidify, while soft-boiled eggs may leave the yolk, and sometimes the white, at least partially liquid and raw. Boiled eggs are a popular breakfast food around the world. Besides a boiling water immersion, there are a few different methods to make boiled eggs. Eggs can also be cooked below the boiling temperature, i.e.
coddling In cooking, to coddle food is to heat it in water kept just below the boiling point. In the past, recipes called for coddling fruit, but in recent times the term is usually only applied to coddled eggs. Coddling differs from poaching in that the ...
, or they can be steamed. The
egg timer An egg timer or kitchen timer is a device whose primary function is to assist in timing during cooking; the name comes from the first timers initially being used for the timing of cooking eggs. Early designs simply counted down for a specific per ...
was named for commonly being used to time the boiling of eggs.


Variations

There are variations both in degree of cooking and in the method of how eggs are boiled, and a variety of kitchen gadgets for eggs exist. These variations include: ;Piercing: Some pierce the shell beforehand with an egg piercer to prevent cracking. Ekelund ''et al.'' in ''Why eggs should not be pierced'' claimed that pricking caused egg white proteins to be damaged and was therefore to be discouraged. Others, including the
American Egg Board The American Egg Board (AEB) is a United States checkoff marketing organization, which focuses on marketing and promotion of eggs for human consumption. The AEB is best known for its long-running slogan, " The Incredible, Edible Egg", and the Jus ...
, recommend against this, as it can introduce bacteria and create hairline cracks in the shell through which bacteria can enter the egg.The American Egg Board, an industry group, recommends against piercing shells on food safety grounds: "Piercing shells before cooking is not recommended. If not sterile, the piercer or needle can introduce
bacteria Bacteria (; singular: bacterium) are ubiquitous, mostly free-living organisms often consisting of one Cell (biology), biological cell. They constitute a large domain (biology), domain of prokaryotic microorganisms. Typically a few micrometr ...
into the egg. Also, piercing creates hairline cracks in the shell through which bacteria can enter after cooking."
Basic Hard-Cooked Eggs
, American Egg Board
;Steaming: Eggs can be taken straight from the refrigerator and placed in the steamer at full steam. ;Sous vide: Boiled eggs can be made by cooking/coddling in their shell "
sous vide Sous vide (; French for 'under vacuum'), also known as low-temperature, long-time (LTLT) cooking, is a method of cooking in which food is placed in a plastic pouch or a glass jar and cooked in a water bath for longer than usual cooking times (usu ...
" in hot water at steady temperatures anywhere from . The outer egg white cooks at and the yolk and the rest of the white sets from . ;Baked eggs: Baking eggs in an oven instead of boiling in water.


Soft-boiled eggs

Chef
Heston Blumenthal Heston Marc Blumenthal (; born 27 May 1966) is a British celebrity chef, TV personality and food writer. Blumenthal is regarded as a pioneer of multi-sensory cooking, food pairing and flavour encapsulation. He came to public attention with u ...
, after "relentless trials", published a recipe for "the perfect boiled egg" suggesting cooking the egg in water that starts cold and covers the egg by no more than a millimeter, removing the pan from the heat as soon as the water starts to bubble. After six minutes, the egg will be ready. Soft-boiled eggs are not recommended for people who may be susceptible to salmonella, such as very young children, the elderly, and those with weakened immune systems. To avoid the issue of salmonella, eggs can be pasteurised in shell at 57 °C for an hour and 15 minutes. The eggs can then be soft-boiled as normal. Soft-boiled eggs are commonly served in
egg cup An egg cup or eggcup, sometimes called an egg server, is an item of tableware used for serving and holding boiled eggs within their shell. Egg cups have an upwardly concave portion to hold the egg and a flat-bottomed base. Egg cups can be made fro ...
s, where the top of the egg is cut off with a knife, spoon, spring-loaded egg topper, or egg scissors, using an
egg spoon An egg spoon is a specialized spoon for eating boiled eggs. In comparison to a teaspoon it typically has a shorter handle and bowl, a more pointed tip and often a more rounded bowl. These characteristics are designed to facilitate the removal of ...
to scoop the egg out. Other methods include breaking the eggshell by tapping gently around the top of the shell with a spoon. Soft-boiled eggs can be eaten with toast cut into strips, which are then dipped into the runny yolk. In the United Kingdom and Australia, these strips of toast are known as " soldiers". In Southeast Asia, a variation of soft-boiled eggs known as half-boiled eggs are commonly eaten at breakfast. The major difference is that, instead of the egg being served in an egg cup, it is cracked into a bowl to which dark or light soy sauce or pepper are added. The egg is also cooked for a shorter period of time resulting in a runnier egg instead of the usual gelatin state and is commonly eaten with
Kaya toast Kaya toast is a dish consisting of two slices of toast with butter and kaya (coconut jam), commonly served alongside coffee and soft-boiled eggs. In Singapore, the dish is commonly consumed for breakfast. It became integrated into kopi tiam (c ...
,
Kopi O Kopi, also known as Nanyang coffee, is a traditional coffee beverage found in several Maritime Southeast Asian nations. Often brewed to be highly caffeinated in strength, it is commonly served with sugar and/or milk-based condiments. This drin ...
, or Milo chocolate milk. Boiled eggs are also an ingredient in various Philippine dishes, such as
embutido (Spanish and Brazilian Portuguese), (European Portuguese) or (Catalan) is a generic term for cured meat products. The dictionary of the Royal Spanish Academy defines it as "intestine stuffed with minced meat, mainly pork; intestine stuffed with ...
,
pancit Pancit ( ), also spelled pansít, is a general term referring to various traditional noodle dishes in Filipino cuisine. There are numerous types of pancit, often named based on the noodles used, method of cooking, place of origin, or the ingr ...
,
relleno The chile relleno (, literally "stuffed chile") is a dish in Mexican cuisine that originated in the city of Puebla. In 1858, it was described as a "green chile pepper stuffed with minced meat and coated with eggs". The most common pepper used is ...
, galantina, and many others. In Japan, soft-boiled eggs are commonly served alongside ramen. The eggs are typically steeped in a mixture of soy sauce, mirin, and water after being boiled and peeled. This provides the egg a brownish color that would otherwise be absent from boiling and peeling the eggs alone. Once the eggs have finished steeping, they are served either in the soup or on the side.


Hard-boiled eggs

Overcooked egg showing green coating on yolk Hard-boiled eggs are boiled long enough for the yolk to solidify. They can be eaten warm or cold. Hard-boiled eggs are the basis for many dishes, such as
egg salad Egg salad is a dish made primarily of chopped hard-boiled or scrambled eggs, mustard, and mayonnaise, often including other ingredients such as celery. It is made mixed with seasonings in the form of herbs, spices and other ingredients, bound ...
, cobb salad and
Scotch egg A Scotch egg is a boiled egg wrapped in sausage meat, coated in breadcrumbs and baked or deep-fried . Origin The ''Oxford English Dictionary'' gives the first instance of the name as of 1809, in an edition of Maria Rundell's '' A New System ...
s, and may be further prepared as
deviled egg Deviled eggs (also known as stuffed eggs, Russian eggs, or dressed eggs) are hard-boiled eggs that have been shelled, cut in half, and filled with a paste made from the egg yolks mixed with other ingredients such as mayonnaise and mustard. ...
s. There are several theories as to the proper technique of hard-boiling an egg, depending on circumstances. One method is to bring water to a boil and cook for ten minutes. Another method is to bring the water to a boil, but then remove the pan from the heat and allow eggs to cook in the gradually cooling water. Over-cooking eggs will typically result in a thin green
iron(II) sulfide Iron(II) sulfide or ferrous sulfide (Br.E. sulphide) is one of a family chemical compounds and minerals with the approximate formula . Iron sulfides are often iron-deficient non-stoichiometric. All are black, water-insoluble solids. Preparatio ...
coating on the yolk. This reaction occurs more rapidly in older eggs as the whites are more alkaline. Immersing the egg in cold water after boiling is a common method of halting the cooking process to prevent this effect. It also causes a slight shrinking of the contents of the egg. Hard-boiled eggs should be used within two hours if kept at room temperature or can be used for a week if kept refrigerated and in the shell. Hard-boiled eggs are commonly sliced, particularly for use in sandwiches. For this purpose specialized
egg slicer An egg slicer is a food preparation utensil used to slice peeled, hard-boiled eggs quickly and evenly. An egg slicer consists of a slotted dish for holding the egg and a hinged plate of wires or blades that can be closed to slice. It was inven ...
s exist, to ease slicing and yield even slices. For consistent slice sizes in food service, several eggs may have their yolk and white separated and poured into a cylindrical mold for stepwise hard-boiling, to produce what is known as a "long egg" or an "egg loaf". Commercial long eggs are produced in Denmark by its inventor and in Japan by . The machine for producing long eggs was first introduced in 1974. In addition to being sliced, long eggs can also be used in their entirety in gala pies.


Peeling

Boiled eggs can vary widely in how easy it is to peel away the shells. In general, the fresher an egg before boiling, the more difficult it is to separate the shell cleanly from the egg white. As a fresh egg ages, it gradually loses both moisture and carbon dioxide through pores in the shell; as a consequence, the contents of the egg shrink and the pH of the albumen becomes more basic. Albumen with higher pH (more basic) is less likely to stick to the egg shell, while pockets of air develop in eggs that have lost significant amounts of moisture, also making eggs easier to peel. Keeping the cooked eggs soaked in water helps keep the membrane under the egg shell moisturized for easy peeling. Peeling the egg under cold running water is an effective method of removing the shell. Starting the cooking in hot water also makes the egg easier to peel. It is often claimed that steaming eggs in a pressure cooker makes them easier to peel. Double blind testing has failed to show any advantage of pressure cooking over steaming, and has further shown that starting boiling in cold water is counterproductive. Shocking the eggs by rapidly cooling them helped, and cooling them in ice water for 15 minutes or longer gave more successful peeling. Shocking was also found to remove the dimple in the base of the egg caused by the air space.How to Make Perfect Hard-Boiled Eggs , The Food Lab
Seriouseats.com (29 July 2020). Retrieved on 2021-06-29.


Dishes featuring boiled eggs

Boiled eggs often form part of larger, more elaborate dishes. For example, a boiled egg may garnish a bowl of ramen (often first marinated in soy sauce), be baked into a pie such as a torta pasqualina, or be encased in
aspic Aspic or meat jelly () is a savory gelatin made with a meat stock or broth, set in a mold to encase other ingredients. These often include pieces of meat, seafood, vegetable, or eggs. Aspic is also sometimes referred to as ''aspic gelée'' or ' ...
(similar to the French dish œufs en gelée, which features poached eggs), be chopped and mixed with mayonnaise to form
egg salad Egg salad is a dish made primarily of chopped hard-boiled or scrambled eggs, mustard, and mayonnaise, often including other ingredients such as celery. It is made mixed with seasonings in the form of herbs, spices and other ingredients, bound ...
, or be deep-fried and then baked within a serving of
Lamprais Lamprais ( en, Lumprice, pron), commonly incorrectly written as “Lumprice”, “Lampraise” or “Lumprais” is a Sri Lankan dish that was introduced by the country's Dutch Burgher population. Lamprais is an Anglicised derivative of the D ...
.


See also

*
Coddled egg In cooking, coddled eggs are eggs that have been cracked into a ramekin or other small container, placed in a water bath or bain-marie and gently or lightly cooked just below boiling temperature. They can be partially cooked, mostly cooked, or ...
*
Deviled egg Deviled eggs (also known as stuffed eggs, Russian eggs, or dressed eggs) are hard-boiled eggs that have been shelled, cut in half, and filled with a paste made from the egg yolks mixed with other ingredients such as mayonnaise and mustard. ...
* Egg piercer *
Haminados Haminados, also known as chaminados, or braised eggs, is a traditional Sephardi Jewish dish, popular in Israel, and commonly served as an ingredient or accompaniment to a number of dishes. Haminados are an important element of Israeli cuisine, a ...
*
List of egg dishes This is a list of notable egg dishes and beverages. Eggs are laid by females of many different species, including birds, reptiles, amphibians, and fish, and have been eaten by humans for thousands of years.Kenneth F. Kiple, ''A Movable Feast: Ten ...
* Pickled beet egg *
Tea egg Tea egg is a typical Chinese savory food commonly sold as a snack, in which a boiled egg is cracked slightly and then boiled again in tea, and sauce or spices. It is also known as marble egg because cracks in the egg shell create darkened ...
*


Notes


References


External links


Basic Hard-Cooked Eggs
American Egg Board
Boiling an Egg – Science Background

Boiling of eggs for molecular gastronomers
* wiki articles on how to boil an egg, poach an egg, and soft boil an egg. An overview of all processes for boiling eggs. {{Eggs Egg dishes