Poached Egg
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Fill a small frying pan with water and add the salt.
Break the egg carefully into a cup.
Poach and serve
When the water simmers at the edge, slip the egg in carefully.
Cook gently until the white is just set.
Remove with a slotted spoon and place on the buttered toast.
Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.
Explore the science
What each ingredient does
- Egg
- Its proteins set with gentle heat, forming the soft white and runny yolk.
- Toast
- Provides a crisp, absorbent base that holds the egg and soaks up its yolk.
The step that matters
Cook gently until the white is just set. Water at a rolling boil breaks the egg apart and makes the white ragged, while gentle simmering lets proteins set slowly around the yolk. Stop once the white is firm so the yolk stays runny.
“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.
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