15 Egg Hacks You Haven't Heard Before
Ah, the humble egg. We can't stop singing its praises, and for good reason. High in protein and imbued with these 17 nutritional superpowers, eggs may well be the perfect weight-loss food. With so many ways to cook eggs, you're bound to find one that piques your interest.
And even if you're not a fan of the egg on by itself, it's still versatile as an ingredient, having the distinction of being able to deliver both structure and lightness to various recipes, depending on how you use it. In honor of the egg's ubiquitous awesomeness, we've come up with these 15 egg hacks you probably haven't heard before. Some cover new and improved methods for cooking and preparing eggs. Others use eggs in unexpected ways to make your recipes sing with healthy glee. Whether you're a novice chef or a cooking expert, you need these tips in your life.
And for more, don't miss these 15 Classic American Desserts That Deserve a Comeback.
The airiest scramble starts with a sieve
Scrambled eggs are meant to be seriously scrambled, as in, you can't tell the yolk from the white because the two are entirely unified. Best scrambled egg practices demand at least a whisk to get that job done, although an immersion blender is even faster and requires less elbow grease.
But if you want to keep those eggs from separating before hitting the pan, try pouring them into the pan through a sieve, as celebrity chef Thomas Keller recommends. The tiny holes help maintain a unified scramble while straining out any traces of shells.
You'll want to keep these scrambled eggs hacks in mind, too.
Add creme fraiche to lock in creaminess
During the quarantine, we started adding mayo to our scrambled eggs for a creamier texture (along with these 24 other genius cooking tricks). But now, we're upping our scrambled eggs game even further with this trick that comes from celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay. Stirring in a spoonful of creme fraiche just as you remove the pan from the heat adds creaminess and locks it in by instantly lowering the temperature of the eggs, which helps prevent the dreaded "rubbery" effect.
Speaking of rubbery eggs, here are 13 of the most common scrambled egg mistakes and how to stop making them.
Poached eggs are within reach
One of the highlights among our 52 life-changing kitchen hacks is that you can scramble your eggs in a microwave (hello, creamy one-dish breakfast!). But guess what else you can make in the microwave—and in under a minute? Perfect poached eggs.
Simply pour a half cup of cold water into a bowl or mug, gently crack an egg and slide it in, and then put the whole thing in the microwave on high for 45 seconds. Note: If you want seconds, be sure to start with a new cup with cold water to keep the temperature just right.
Here's why fresh eggs are so crucial to a good poach.
Poached scrambled eggs are a thing
Dou you love scrambled eggs but hate having to enhance those eggs with butter or other fats? Poached scrambled eggs deliver all that you love about scrambled eggs but with the healthy quotient of being poached.
In a medium-sized saucepan, heat a few inches of lightly salted water over medium heat. While that's going, whip up your eggs. Once the water is boiling, stir it rapidly, and pour the eggs through a sieve or other strainer into the spinning water. Cover the pan for 20 seconds, then remove from the heat and uncover. Your poached scrambled eggs will be floating on the surface. Using a strainer, remove the eggs from the water and place them on paper towels to drain briefly before serving.
Perfectly cook sunny-side-up eggs
Sunny-side-up eggs (i.e., fried eggs that don't get flipped over before being served) are great if you love your fried eggs with a gooey liquid yolk surrounded by medium-cooked whites. The only drawback for some is the thin layer of uncooked egg-white film over the yolk. If that slick film is what has you defaulting to over-easy, you could melt a little extra butter in the pan and use it to baste the yolk, which firms the film. But why add butter when water will do the trick? Simply add a few spoonfuls of water to the pan. The water will heat up immediately, at which point you can spoon it gently over the egg yolk, turning that film perfectly, deliciously translucent.
Here are the 72 Best Healthy Egg Recipes for Weight Loss.
Top your avocado toast for a doctor-approved breakfast
In our list of 87 easy brunch recipes, we talked about how to turn your avocado toast into a better-than-bruschetta lycopene-delivery system (here's more on lycopene and why you need more of it in your life). But you can up your avocado toast game even more by adding two sunny-side-up eggs, according to Daniel Paull, MD, who regards the avo-egg combo as a near-perfect breakfast because of its high-protein, high-fiber, and high-lutein content.
Round eggs are the secret to perfect egg sandwiches
If the pandemic (or a general distaste for preservatives) has kept you away from Egg McMuffins, here's some great news. The perfect egg sandwich can be made at home if you follow the secret trick for making McDonald's perfectly "round eggs." Simply place a nonstick egg ring on the griddle over medium heat. Crack an egg into the center, allowing the yolk to break. Once the egg has set (about three minutes), use a spatula to remove it from the griddle and place it between two slices of an English muffin layered with uncured Canadian bacon (or any of the healthy bacon identified here) and sliced cheese. Remove the ring, et voila.
Make sheet pan egg sandwiches for a crowd
When cooking for a crowd, the egg-ring method for cooking up egg sandwiches might seem tedious. But no worries—we have a hack for that. Simply whisk up all your eggs in a bowl with a splash of milk and some salt and pepper. Pour the eggs into a sheet pan or other baking dish and bake at 450 degrees Fahrenheit for 15 minutes or until set. Slice into squares for individual sandwiches.
Here are 37 more super-easy sheet pan meals to make easy work of cooking for a crowd.
Use your Instant Pot to make egg salad
Making egg salad for a crowd ordinarily would involve boiling some number of eggs in a pot and then peeling the whole lot. But if you have an Instant Pot, you can avoid all that tedious peeling. Simply crack all the eggs you're going to need and place them in your Instant Pot with water (eight eggs to one cup water). Cook for five minutes, cool, and get chopping.
Here's how to cook eggs perfectly using just about any cooking method.
Say "YES" to the perfect omelets
All you need to make the perfect omelet is to say "YES" to this perfect omelet recipe. Here's how you say YES:
- "Y" is for "Yellow," as, in before you get cooking, scramble up those eggs until the yolk and white are completely uniform. In other words, all you'll see is yellow through and through.
- "E" is for "Easy," as in "easy on the heat." Setting your temperature so that there is no sizzle when you drop water on the surface, which will yield a perfectly cooked omelet with no brown spots.
- "S" is for "STOP," as in "stop cooking" before you think the omelet is cooked all the way through. It will continue to cook even after you plate it.
Here's why it's best to steer clear of the sous vide method for cooking omelets.
Use eggs to add structure to gluten-free pie crust
Generally speaking, pie crust is made of three parts flour, two parts butter (or shortening), and one part ice water, plus a dash of salt, and an optional spoonful of sugar. You just mix it up and roll it out, touching it with your warm hands as little as possible. Unfortunately, this literally falls apart when you use gluten-free flour (even when using one of these gluten-free flours, which come highly recommended).
To keep your crust together, stir one egg into the dry ingredients before adding water, and then only add as much water as you still need to form your dough. The protein in the egg provides the crucial structure that gluten-free flour lacks.
Eggs make mashed potatoes super-creamy
To make mashed potatoes super-creamy without adding any cream, add egg yolks. This advice comes from actor-couple Stanley Tucci and Felicity Blunt, who share their secret in their cookbook, The Tucci Table. Try it in our recipe for easy garlic mashed potatoes, stirring in the yolk of one raw pasteurized egg after mashing the potatoes but while the potatoes are still steaming hot.
Stir in eggs to enrich soups
Adding an egg to a smooth and/or creamy soup not only enhances the soup's silkiness, but it also adds protein. Broth-based soups can also benefit from the addition of an egg. Simply drizzle a beaten egg into a steaming, hot bowl, and enjoy your personalized version of egg drop soup. Here are 19 more broth-based soups that support weight-loss.
The key to perfect boiled eggs is simple
So much has been written on precisely what it takes to make the best-boiled eggs that the process of boiling eggs has come to seem far more confusing than it needs to be. It all "boils" down to this:
- For soft-cooked eggs, place the raw eggs into boiling water.
- For hard-cooked eggs, place the raw eggs into cold water.
In terms of how long the eggs should cook, soft-boiled eggs will be delightfully jammy after six minutes in boiling water (as soon as you place the eggs in the boiling water, set a timer for six minutes). Hard-boiled eggs should be firm-but-not-overcooked 10 minutes after the water has come to a boil (as soon as the water comes to a boil, remove the pot from the stove, and set your timer for 10 minutes).
Make the best coffee of your life—with eggs
Some call it Scandinavian, or Swedish, coffee. Others simply know it as the best coffee they've ever tasted. Whatever name you might call it by, the secret is in…wait for it…a raw egg. That's right, a raw egg absorbs impurities that would otherwise impart bitterness into the brew. To take advantage of nature's most effective and least paper-wasting coffee-purifier, here's what to do:
- Measure out your coffee grounds (for a single serving, use three tablespoons).
- Mix in a whole raw egg.
- Bring water to boiling (for a single serving, you'll start with three cups).
- Add egg-coffee mixture to the boiling water, and continue boiling for three minutes.
- Remove from the heat and pour in one cup of cold water.
- Strain (leaving behind a clump of egg and grounds), and serve.
Note: the color of this coffee is golden-brown, as opposed to your more typical coffee-brown, but trust us when we say it's every bit as strong (just without the bitterness).
Who says eggs are just a morning food? Expand your horizons with these 25 breakfast-for-dinner recipes.
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