How to make poached eggs step by step?

How to make poached eggs Pour boiling water into a shallow pan or frying pan, to a depth of about 3cm. Bring back to the boil then reduce to a simmer. Crack each egg into a. cup, then gently tip. ... Using medium eggs, simmer for: 2 minutes - soft. ... Carefully remove the poached egg with a slotted spoon and serve immediately.

Why put vinegar in water for poached eggs?

The other way is to increase the acidity of how you're cooking it . "Vinegar is an inherently acidic material, so if we add a few drops of vinegar into that boiling water that is going to increase the rate of denaturing and it's going to make that happen faster and help the poached egg hold its shape better."

How to make poached eggs like a restaurant?

When cooking poached eggs, the water should be kept at a low simmer at around 180°F (82°C) . Doing so will prevent the egg whites from separating from the yolks. After the eggs have been added to the saucepan, gently cook at this temperature until they reach the desired doneness, anywhere between 3 and 5 minutes.

What is the best trick for poached eggs?

Use vinegar Poaching an egg in a little vinegar helps the egg maintain its form while poaching. The vinegar helps the egg whites cook faster, allowing the egg to better stay together. Just adding about a Tablespoon of vinegar to your water can make all the difference. And that's on chemistry.

How long should poached eggs be in water for?

Stir the water to create a gentle whirlpool which will help the egg white wrap around the yolk. Then carefully slide the egg into the water making sure the heat is low enough not to throw the egg around - there should only be small bubbles rising. Cook for 3-4 mins , until the white is cooked through.

Why you should stop poaching eggs in boiling water?

If the water is allowed to come to a full boil, it could spell disaster for your egg. There's a reason it should be at a low simmer and not a boil. The strong bubbles and moving water will crash into the delicate egg whites and yolks as they cook .

How to make poached eggs taste better?

Add a generous pinch of salt and a little bit of vinegar . The salt helps season the eggs, and the vinegar helps the egg whites stay together while they poach. The vinegar is optional, but I use it when I poach eggs. (We only use 1 tablespoon, which isn't enough to flavor the eggs.)

What is the ratio of vinegar to water for poaching eggs?

Heat the water: Add enough water to come 1 inch up the side of a narrow, deep 2-quart saucier. Add 1 teaspoon kosher salt and 2 teaspoons white vinegar and bring to a simmer over medium heat. Meanwhile, crack 1 very fresh cold large egg into a custard cup or small ramekin.

How to make perfect poached eggs without a poacher?

Add a teaspoon of white vinegar to a small saucepan of cold water and bring to boil. Turn heat off and stir the water to form a swirl, and add the egg, it helps to keep the white intact, rather than it separating. Place a lid on the saucepan and leave for 3-4 minutes.

How do you poach an egg and keep it together?

Simply bring a pot of water to a boil and add vinegar, salt, and pepper — then use a whisk to create a strong whirlpool. Crack your egg directly into the swirl, then let it poach for 90 seconds to two minutes. The whirlpool keeps it together and gives it a nice round shape.

How do you poach an egg in a cup of boiling water?

2With a spoon, begin stirring the boiling water in a large, circular motion. 3When the water is swirling like a tornado, add the eggs. The swirling water will help the egg white wrap around itself as it cooks. 4Cook for about 2 1/2 to 3 minutes.

Easy Poached Eggs Recipe (2024)

Why It Works

Straining eggs in a fine-mesh strainer removes excess wispy, loose whites, creating tight, perfectly-shaped eggs.
Poaching at a 180°F (82°C) sub-simmer means fewer disturbances in the water, and cleaner, more tender cooking.

Wouldn't it be great if there were a poached egg method that works every time, and better yet, allows you to poach your eggs in advance, ready to be served at moment's notice?

I've wanted to write about poached eggs for a while. Egg-poaching is a technique that looms large in my legend, as it would for anyone who's had to cook several hundreds (or maybe even thousands) of them in various restaurants. See, even after years of practice, my success rate hovered at maybe around 75%.

Every time I dropped an egg in the pan, I'd make sure to drop a second, knowing that at least half the time, one of them would break or come out looking like a wispy ghost, its wet white tentacles threatening to spread over your toasted English muffin or shrouding yourfrisée aux lardonssalad. That's the last thing I'd wish on any diner paying over the odds for a perfect salad.

It wasn't until I discovered this technique, which you'll see in the video—something I first heard from insane British chefHeston Blumenthal—that my success rate suddenly soared to, well, pretty much 100%, where it's stayed ever since. The method was actually first mentioned inThe Curious Cook, Harold McGee's second book. Strange, because I'd read the book countless times, yet somehow this one trick never stuck with me. Hopefully it'll stick better with you.

The trick is easy, requires nothing more than a fine-mesh strainer,and unlike every other poached egg trick out there, this onereallyreally works.

First, get yourself some really fresh eggs. Fresh eggs have tighter whites and yolks that help them retain their shape better as they cook.

There are two ways to tell how fresh an egg is. The first is to check something called the Julian date. As long as it's packed in the US, every carton of eggs has a number between 000 and 365 on it. And that number corresponds to the day on which the egg was cleaned and packaged. So a number of 000 would mean January 1st, 003 would be January 4th, and so on. All you really need to know is that the higher that number, the fresher the egg.

You can also tell how fresh an egg is by carefully putting it into a cup of water. As an egg ages, the air pocket in the fat end is going to get bigger and bigger, which will make the egg stand upright or sometimes even float. A really fresh egg will sink and lie flat on its back.

Once you've got your fresh egg, the second tool you need is something I saw first suggested by British chef Heston Blumenthal: a fine-mesh strainer.

You see, no matter how fresh your eggs are, there is always going to be some amount of liquid white. It's this excess white that causes misshapen eggs - you know those really ugly ones with the wispy white floaters that completely ruin your brunch.

To get rid of them, we're going to transfer our eggs to a fine-mesh strainer, and gently swirl it around until all the excess white is drained away. What you're left with is a nice, tight egg.

Even better is that the strainer is actually the ideal tool for lowering the egg into the water. In a pot of water at 180°F (82°C), which is just about the temperature that the water is quivering but not quite simmering yet, I gently lower the strainer with the egg into the water, move it back and forth a little bit to make sure the egg isn't stuck, and then carefully roll the egg out.

Just like a kid, it's these early formative stages of a poached egg's life that are going to determine how it turns out in the end. Using the round-bottomed strainer and rolling motion is going to help ensure that you'll get a nice, tight poached egg that's, well, egg-shaped.

If you want to cook multiple eggs, just make sure that you have them cracked into separate dishes and ready to go. Once they're in the water, your only job is to keep them moving around, flipping them from time to time with a slotted spoon, so that they cook evenly. It takes about three and a half to four minutes.

You can even cook them ahead of time and store them submerged in cold water in the fridge for up to a few days. To reheat them, just transfer them to a bowl of hot water for a few minutes just before serving.

April 2014

Recipe Details