Boiled Eggs
Ingredients
Directions
Boil the eggs
Place eggs in a saucepan of boiling water, using a spoon to avoid cracking.
Boil for 3 minutes for soft eggs or 10 minutes for hard eggs.
Other methods
Alternatively, start with cold water and bring to a boil, which takes about 10 minutes for a custard-like consistency.
For a different method, use an egg boiler or a covered bowl, cover the eggs with boiling water, and let stand for 3 minutes.
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
- Eggs
- Egg proteins set with heat, so the cooking time decides whether the white and yolk stay soft or firm.
The step that matters
Boil for 3 minutes for soft eggs or 10 minutes for hard eggs.. Egg proteins set progressively as heat reaches them. Timing from the moment the water returns to a boil controls whether the yolk stays runny, custard-like, or fully firm.
“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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