Best Hard-Boiled Egg Method - tested head to head

July 16, 2023 3:20 PM

We Tried 7 Ways to Hard-Boil Eggs and Found a Clear Winner Ann Taylor Pittman for The Kitchn. "I was delighted to find that most methods worked quite well. A couple gave less-than-stellar results, and some received higher ratings from me because they produced great eggs with less effort. I rated each method on a scale of 10, with one being the worst, and 10 being the best. While a few scored very well, only one method scored a 10 out of 10. You may also be interested in Do 'Better' Eggs Really Taste Better? by J. Kenji López-Alt at Serious Eats, and 9 Egg Gadgets I’ve Tested (So You Don’t Have to) from www.emmymade.com.
posted by bq (53 comments total)

López-Alt, there is none higher
Sucker MCs should bring a large pot (about three quarts) of water to a boil, lower in up to six eggs, boil for 30 seconds, and then cover, reduce the heat to low, and simmer for 11 minutes.
posted by gwint at 3:26 PM on July 16, 2023 [8 favorites]

I am surprised that these articles give a clear winner to one egg boiling method, and yet say that there isn’t a taste difference. My experience - as a vegetarian who eats a lot of boiled eggs when lazy - is absolutely the other way round. I won’t say that the free range eggs are all better, but I would say that the cheaper battery/farmed eggs are less good. However i am eating European eggs; American egg farming is a different story and might have some bearing on taste
posted by The River Ivel at 3:34 PM on July 16, 2023 [1 favorite]

Dash Egg Cooker, which is technically the steam method. Pry from my cold dead hands etc etc.
posted by Lyn Never at 3:37 PM on July 16, 2023 [6 favorites]

Egg.
posted by Literaryhero at 3:38 PM on July 16, 2023 [9 favorites]

I'm glad to see they included the "I need a handy device that can scramble an egg while its still inside its shell" gizmo from back in the day.

I do think the method they went about cooking said egg afterward entirely negated the "scrambled egg inside shell" wonderfulness.

I had one of these decades ago and scrambled a bunch of eggs to take camping. Granted you can't let them sit long once the shell is breached so they were First Morning Breakfast, but there was something wonderful about cracking out eggs into a frying pan and having scrambled eggs without the normal fuss.
posted by hippybear at 3:40 PM on July 16, 2023 [2 favorites]

The dealbreaker for me in most of these methods is involving ice water bath. Only got 3 ice cube trays to go around, don't wanna be wasting it cooling off eggs
posted by GoblinHoney at 3:44 PM on July 16, 2023 [10 favorites]

As long as your tap water runs fairly cool, a couple changes of cold tap water will do the job. Like, put the eggs in a good-size bowl of water and move them around for maybe 2 minutes to draw off the initial heat, dump and refill, and then you can dump and refill again a few minutes later if you remember.
posted by Lyn Never at 3:51 PM on July 16, 2023 [6 favorites]

In my experience the ice water bath is about shrinking the egg and making it pull away from the shell for peeling. I'd like to see something similar about whether this is actually true, but during the times I've been out of ice and have tried using even fridge-temp water for the post-boil bath, it's been much more difficult to peel.

Also when I'm peeling, I do it IN the ice water they're bathing in. It takes a bigger bowl, but cracking the eggs in the water and peeling them there makes them much easier to peel, in my experience, than taking them out of the water and peeling them then.
posted by hippybear at 3:51 PM on July 16, 2023 [1 favorite]

Last time I used a "foolproof method for boiling eggs" I ended up with half-cooked yolk and the shell coming away with chunks of white attached, so I don't believe anything any more..
posted by Peach at 3:54 PM on July 16, 2023 [7 favorites]

Pah. If you're not first boiling then simmering your eggs for 7 hours with onion skins what's the point?
posted by urbanwhaleshark at 3:56 PM on July 16, 2023 [3 favorites]

Last time I used a "foolproof method for boiling eggs" I ended up with half-cooked yolk

To me, a half cooked yolk sounds perfect! But I guess that's why I don't really like hard boiled eggs.
posted by aubilenon at 4:05 PM on July 16, 2023 [2 favorites]

Egg.
posted by Literaryhero at 6:38 PM on July 16


EGG.
posted by jeremias at 4:06 PM on July 16, 2023 [3 favorites]

For me, the trick to easy-peel eggs has not been in the cooking method but in tapping the fat end of the egg against the counter or with a utensil gently until you hear a single loud "snap" and then cooking however you want. I think the snap sound was presented as separating the membrane from the shell but it seems to be creating a tiny crack at that end; maybe that's one and the same. Anyway, I hard boiled a dozen eggs today (I'm a start in cold water, bring to boil, then turn down to simmer for 8 minutes + ice bath gal) and every one peeled with zero effort.
posted by misskaz at 4:07 PM on July 16, 2023 [1 favorite]

I use Kenji's basic method, but I don't use that much water. I've used up to 8 eggs in 1.5 liters of water, and they come out fine.
posted by mollweide at 4:08 PM on July 16, 2023

Knowing i could do better than fridge eggs into tap water, lid, heat to boil, shut off, and walk away is just too easy to get me to try and up my game. i try to buy at least three dozen at a time so the pealing is easy towards the end.
posted by wmo at 4:16 PM on July 16, 2023

Why do some of the yolks in the pictures have little divots in the center?
posted by Greg_Ace at 4:24 PM on July 16, 2023

I am Team Steaming all the way for both hard- and soft-boiled eggs, if for no other reason that you only need to bring an inch (or less, depending on how snugly your pan lid fits) of water to a boil, which if you start with hot tap water takes only a couple of minutes, as opposed to the quantities of water required for any of the boiling/simmering methods. You also do not need to do the post-cooldown shaking that the Kitchn prescribes (I mean, it works and all, but really not necessary).
posted by Kat Allison at 4:30 PM on July 16, 2023 [3 favorites]

I'm guessing if the yolk is more moist it catches on the knife instead of just slicing through? The difference between an 11 minute egg and a 13 minute egg, for me, is if the yolk is wet/crumbly or actually dry/solid.
posted by hippybear at 4:31 PM on July 16, 2023

I think it's a law of nature that every article attempting to determine the best method of hard boiling eggs has to disagree with every other such article.
posted by indexy at 4:45 PM on July 16, 2023 [7 favorites]

Egg.
posted by Literaryhero at 6:38 PM on July 16


EGG.
posted by jeremias at 7:06 PM on July 16

Egg.
posted by General Malaise at 4:46 PM on July 16, 2023 [3 favorites]

I do the bake-in-the-muffin-pan thing. I take boiled eggs to work as a quick and easy lunch, and I don't mind eggs that are a bit rubbery. Shells come off consistently for me - I don't doubt that they're right that there are better ways but low-effort is one of the things that attracts me to boiled eggs in the first place.
posted by AdamCSnider at 4:46 PM on July 16, 2023

I started steaming eggs at the outset of the pandemic. I get an inch or so of water boiling in a 4 qt pot and then drop in the steamer basket loaded with 8 eggs. Over a few weeks, I discovered that, as long as I used the same AA large eggs from the same farm, or farm cooperative, I got perfectly cooked, and almost always perfectly peelable, eggs when steamed for exactly 13 minutes and then plunged it into in a cold water bath, steamer basket and all, in the sink for about 15 minutes.

During one of the pandemic egg shortages, I used an alternate egg supplier and found that the 13 minute steaming produced under-cooked eggs—the whites were just set and the yolks were goopy.
posted by bz at 4:47 PM on July 16, 2023 [2 favorites]

without the normal fuss.

what
posted by mhoye at 5:20 PM on July 16, 2023 [3 favorites]

I usually go with the steamed method because I find it very consistent and controllable. I shoot for medium rather than hard boiled (or even less if I want semi-gooey yolks for jazzing up ramen).

Oh, and I always pierce the big end with a thumbtack as Jacques Pepin recommends.
posted by Greg_Ace at 5:29 PM on July 16, 2023 [2 favorites]

Did soft boiled eggs for tonight's udon (boil water, add from fridge, 6 minutes, ice bath, peel) and broke the whites (but not the yolks) on both. Sigh!
posted by stevil at 5:55 PM on July 16, 2023

Partly because I love the technology, I've tried over a period of years do hard boiled eggs in a pressure cooker with generally unsatisfactory results

But just in time for the egg shortage, I tried an old Innova- style 1500W 8L electric pressure cooker, with eggs in a wire basket six inches above the water, at 15 pounds pressure for 5 minutes followed by natural pressure release and no water bath, and they were just perfect.

The only difficulty in peeling was being sure to catch them when they fell out after I cracked the shell.

If I cooked them for 6 minutes or more, they came out of the shell very slightly browned, and I’ve been meaning to push that a little further and see how I liked the taste, but I haven’t.
posted by jamjam at 5:59 PM on July 16, 2023 [3 favorites]

López-Alt, there is none higher

Jacques Pepin or GTFO.

Speaking of which, does anyone know if one of the recipes uses his method of piercing the shell with a pin?
posted by fiercekitten at 6:19 PM on July 16, 2023 [1 favorite]

Who has 35 minutes to boil an egg?
posted by scruss at 6:25 PM on July 16, 2023 [3 favorites]

Every one of those hard boiled egg methods but the pressure cooker and the baking need a big old footnote about the effects of altitude on the cook time.

Also, I've found that two and a half to three weeks from chicken butt to cooking is the ideal amount of time to get the eggs to peel perfectly with the pressure cooker method.
posted by Gygesringtone at 6:27 PM on July 16, 2023

Instant Pot eggs 5-5-5 method - 5m pressure, 5m natural release, 5m ice bath - is so easy and is the only way I've ever been able to consistently make peelable eggs. Plus you don't change the timing whether you use 6 eggs or 18. I put the eggs on a metal steamer basket with 2c* of water in the bottom, then lift the whole basket up and into the ice water after the cooking time is done. (Or at least I try to do that but the eggs are inevitably unbalanced so they plop back into the IP but we all need a challenge.)

* 8 qt models are supposed to use a minimum of 2c liquid. I think the 6 qt would be just 1c.
posted by rouftop at 6:39 PM on July 16, 2023 [5 favorites]

The ice bath is overkill. When done, take the pot and place in the sink. Dump the hot water and run the tap, cold water. The eggs will heat the water, run the tap again and replace with cold water. Repeat this about four or five times, takes just a few minutes. Using ice isn't really that much faster.
posted by zardoz at 6:45 PM on July 16, 2023 [2 favorites]

I'm legit curious about the energy/conservation of water comparison between using an ice bath and multiple rounds of tap water as zardoz claims. Not suggesting anything; I really have no idea.
posted by Greg_Ace at 7:00 PM on July 16, 2023 [2 favorites]

The ice bath is overkill. When done, take the pot and place in the sink. Dump the hot water and run the tap, cold water. The eggs will heat the water, run the tap again and replace with cold water. Repeat this about four or five times, takes just a few minutes. Using ice isn't really that much faster.

Agreed, but in my experience, you don't need multiple changes of water to cool a small number of eggs and make them peel easily. I steam 1-2 eggs (7-8 minutes because I love jammy yolks and reasonably firm whites), then take the pot to the sink, dump the hot water, and add cold water to a level 1-2 inches above the egg(s). I then crack/roll each egg on the counter so that I get a little pattern of cracks, then put it back in the water. Within a couple of minutes, the egg(s) cool enough to handle and peel perfectly.

If you're cooking a lot of eggs at once, you may need more water to cool the eggs down reasonably quickly, but you don't need ice, a full 15 minutes, or superstitious shaking of the container. As long as you are not going for very soft eggs with barely firm whites, crazing the egg shells and letting cooler water seep in between the white and the shell does most of the work for you without damaging the taste or texture of the egg white.
posted by maudlin at 7:22 PM on July 16, 2023 [3 favorites]

Chinese home here.....use the rice cooker. Empty, clean rice cooker. The rice cooker I have is the simplest one, plug in for on/push button to start/unplug to stop so not the fancy Cukoo kind.Wet a single sheet paper towel so its slightly dripping wet. Place paper towel on bottom of rice cooker. Place eggs in single layer on top of towel and push button to start, place lid. Let it do its thing and when the cooker pops over to "warm", eggs are done. If I need them immediately, I place in cold water so I can handle them. If its for next weeks meals, I just place them in a container and place in fridge. Takes roughly 20minutes and the biggest worry for me is to unplug the cooker to turn it "off".
posted by tipsyBumblebee at 7:27 PM on July 16, 2023 [11 favorites]

I can't speak to hard boiled eggs, but for soft boiled eggs, I'd just have a robot do it for you.
posted by phooky at 7:36 PM on July 16, 2023 [1 favorite]

@tipsyBumblebee that’s ingenious
posted by device55 at 8:04 PM on July 16, 2023

I'm more of a scrambled guy, but sometimes I want egg salad. This only seems to happen in summer. So a big pot of boiling water in my 100 degree kitchen isn't wanted.

So I break down and take the lazy man's way out: peeled, boiled eggs from the grocery store. They're a little more expensive, but come in packages of 6, I don't need a dozen for a little salad.
posted by Marky at 12:42 AM on July 17, 2023 [1 favorite]

In Germany you can buy ready to eat hard boiled xenomorph eggs at the grocery store.
posted by autopilot at 1:23 AM on July 17, 2023 [2 favorites]

I do the 'boil and remove from heat' thing, but on autopilot. Because I do it in my electric kettle.
It works just fine and is easier than anything else i've tried.
posted by Too-Ticky at 1:54 AM on July 17, 2023

Use this calculator if you want soft boiled eggs. You can choose your egginess factor on a scale of 0 (ick) to 100 (rock solid).
posted by Arctic Circle at 2:26 AM on July 17, 2023

Instant Pot eggs 5-5-5 method - 5m pressure, 5m natural release, 5m ice bath - is so easy and is the only way I've ever been able to consistently make peelable eggs.

Yep! I do this with 18-24 eggs all the time and it works great. Easy to peel too.
posted by mmoncur at 3:47 AM on July 17, 2023 [3 favorites]

My instant pot method is to use 7 min pressure. I usually do a manual pressure release right after that but it works fine if I don't get around to it for another 5 minutes or so. And then I just slosh it around in an ice bath for a minute or two.

Getting correctly, reliable cooked easily peel-able eggs is good, and being able to do so while not having to stand there and stare at it and be involved in the whole cooking process is an absolute delight.
posted by rmd1023 at 4:17 AM on July 17, 2023

So, 35 minutes for a 10/10 way to boil eggs, but only 22 minutes to get 9/10, and the latter method is … boil them?
posted by caviar2d2 at 4:55 AM on July 17, 2023 [1 favorite]

Mrs. Caviar says the pH of the albumin changes over time, so using less-fresh eggs is key. Plus run cold water over them after.
posted by caviar2d2 at 4:59 AM on July 17, 2023

Yea, eggs that have been in the fridge a few days is much better than ones straight home from the shop. We use the Instant Pot method, 5 minutes pressure, 3 minute release, tap water to cool.
posted by seanmpuckett at 5:29 AM on July 17, 2023

Years ago a coworker was mocking his son (who was living on his own for the first time) for not even knowing how to boil an egg.

1) Who didn't teach him how to boil an egg? 2) As this article demonstrates there's a bit more to boiling an egg than putting water in a pot and turning on the heat: you have to take them off the heat at just the right time and cool them properly. In fact I thought I hated hard boiled eggs when I was a kid. Turns out I like them — my parents just boiled them until they were inedible.

+1 for the steaming method. I like that It uses less water and therefore less energy than boiling. And if I steam 6 eggs for 8:45-9 minutes, I don’t need water or ice to cool them down. I just put them directly in the fridge.
posted by Tehhund at 6:33 AM on July 17, 2023 [4 favorites]

I have a combi-steam oven (y’all, they’re the BEST) and I just pop a bunch of eggs directly onto the rack and hit the 100% steam button.
posted by antinomia at 6:54 AM on July 17, 2023 [1 favorite]

Picknickeier! On a bike camping trip through part of Germany, these were just amazing.
Why have boring eggs when you can have the Xenomorph eggs?
posted by Acari at 6:57 AM on July 17, 2023

One of the reasons to buy the Dash Egg Cooker is that the little water cup it comes with has THE best egg piercer I've ever used, and I have been through a bunch. I cannot get it to work with a thumbtack, I just end up Baby Hueying a handful of raw egg, and I don't have great success with my expensive German precision egg-piercer, but the Dash one is perfect.

But I have also recently learned the "tap the fat end with the back of a spoon until the sound changes" trick that allegedly air-bubbles the membrane away from the shell without piercing or cracking, and results so far have been as promising as the piercer.
posted by Lyn Never at 7:34 AM on July 17, 2023 [2 favorites]

egg
posted by exlotuseater at 11:50 AM on July 17, 2023 [1 favorite]

what kind of eggs you like?
posted by moonmilk at 5:41 PM on July 17, 2023

I have an asparagus pot. When I bought it I was prepared for it to be one of those things that gets put in the back of the cupboard, but no, I use it in spring for asparagus (which it cooks perfectly), corn on the cob in summer, and hard-boiled eggs all year long. I steam them and pull the inner basket out to put under a stream of cool water in the sink.
posted by acrasis at 5:50 PM on July 17, 2023 [1 favorite]

I have an asparagus pot

I now totally want one of these, though honestly I've already got tools that accomplish the same thing. For instance I generally prefer to marinate then broil or roast asparagus rather than steam it; and I have not one but two (don't ask) steamer baskets that fit my existing pans and that will fit 6 eggs - which, since I live alone, will easily last me a week. Also, I've taken to boiling long pasta in a 12" frying pan, using less water so it concentrates the starch content, which is useful.

But it's an elegant tool and I still want one.
posted by Greg_Ace at 8:16 PM on July 17, 2023 [1 favorite]