shot of sass, served on (n)ice

Saturday, August 9, 2008

Hard Boiled Disaster

I NEED HELP! (Is this a surprise to anyone, really?)

Yesterday I decided to use Pen's handy dandy tip for hard boiling eggs and getting the shells to come off like a charm because for the history of my life I have never, ever been able to cook them correctly. It's not rocket science, I know, but holy smokes those damn eggs get me every time, yesterday included, when I got distracted and let them cook for way too long. Which leads to the shells sticking to the egg like glue and leaves me with a pile of yolk and scraps of white.

Thank goodness I was only making egg salad, but I do tend to get a little nervous when deviled eggs are called for because those delicious little egg white boats need to be pretty, something that mine most decidedly ARE NOT.

Could someone please help me not let Pen's tip (which is so genius, along with the Melt Your Face cleaner that I just bought the ammonia for this week) go down in a boiling pot of egg flames and tell me your 100% sure fire way to boil eggs? Start them in cold water, or add once it's boiling? Boil for how long? Cover or no?

I NEED ANSWERS! My next covered dish meal depends on it!

5 tips left at the bar:

Ruby said...

A few things, now that I have hit publish:

- Google could help me here, but I'd rather hear from our people

- Wondering where the recipe for the Melt Your Face cleaner is? Pen *might* have slipped this one to me early (because she knows how I dig this stuff) and oops, I just taunted you with it. I'm sure if you ask her real sweet, she'll give it to you (or just out and out demand it, that might work too).

- DID YOU SEE MY PUN? Boy how I love a good pun and this one was totally unintentional! Pen's TIP! Ha!

Anonymous said...

The easy and very worth while solution is simple. Go out to the store and buy yourself a handy dandy egg timer. Like one of these http://tinyurl.com/6xyguh. They're pretty much a no fail cheap solution and you will never bang your head against the wall again

penelope said...

Ooo boy, that means I have two cleaning posts to do this week! Ay, ay, cap'n.

I put the eggs in a pot of COLD water, maybe an inch over the eggs. Splash of vinegar, small or large in proportion to number of eggs. Turn burner to high. As soon as the water gets to a ROLLING BOIL, set the timer to 18 minutes. Leave the burner on high, do not cover. When the timer goes off, (carefully) dump out the water, fill with cold water to cover. Then dump a bunch of ice on top of that, to make sure they're really going to stop cooking. Voila.

This TIP brought to you by PEN, heeeheehee.

Karen said...

So, the secret to easy-peel eggs is to make sure your eggs are NOT fresh. (Not spoiled/expired, but not brand-new either.) The older an egg is, the more air it absorbs between the shell and the membrane. That air pocket makes eggs easy to peel. (Watched this on the Food Network during a bout of insomnia!) The trick to hard boiling perfect eggs is to place the eggs in a pot, cover with cold water, and bring to a boil. Once the water is boiling, cover the pot and take it off the burner. Let the eggs sit for 15 minutes. You will have the perfect yolks (tender, and not hard or bouncy.) Voila!

Niki said...

I would help you Megs, but let's be honest: I have never boiled eggs in my life. Ok, maybe once, but I was probably drunk.