The Secret to Perfect Poached Eggs in the Shell

I can’t think of a more finicky way to cook eggs than boiling. Do it right and you’ll end up with a plump oval ball that could easily be mistaken for a fresh mozzarella ball, but if done wrong, you’ll end up with a whirlwind of thin egg white surrounding a naked boiled egg yolk. . Luckily, OG’s culinary goddess, Julia Child, gave us a trick on how to nail a perfectly shaped poached egg, I just made it a little lazier.

The ideal poached egg has rounded edges, a plump oval shape, and loses some of the egg white in the water. It is almost as tall as a boiled egg, but the texture is completely different, silky and custard-like. Julie’s trick was to poke a hole in the eggshell with a pin and boil the whole egg, shell included, for 10 seconds. Once that’s done, she’ll take the egg out of the jacuzzi, crack the egg, and boil it as usual. The idea is that a brief immersion in boiling water is just beginning to grab the outermost layer of the egg white. When you peel it, the egg white should hold its shape and not run down the bottom of the pan or spill the egg white into the water.

The hole allows air to escape from the egg in a controlled manner when the egg is immersed in boiling water so it doesn’t explode randomly. I don’t keep pins in the kitchen to pierce eggshells, and with a cat that has a habit of eating non-food items in the kitchen, I don’t tend to start. Instead of poking, I gently flick it against the counter.

I use the gentlest stroke to make the smallest crack possible. When the egg cracks, lower it into the boiling water with a slotted spoon. (I also add a teaspoon of vinegar to the boiling water to speed up curdling, but this is optional.) Count to ten and use the same spoon to scoop out the egg. It doesn’t have to be a perfect 10 count, I actually waited about 30 seconds for one of my trials and it worked just as well. You will see how the crack expands in the water and maybe even a small white bubble will burst out of it, and this is normal, 10 seconds is not enough for something to be completely welded. Remove the egg and let it cool slightly on a kitchen towel while you lower the temperature of the water to a gentle simmer. Crack the egg into a shallow bowl (or, if you’re daring, crack it straight into the water). The egg will not look any different than a raw egg. You will think that nothing happened, but it did. Boil the egg as usual.

What I saw was nothing but witchcraft. The egg held on to its white with a tenacity I had never seen before, and the shape of the egg was oval and round, like the poached egg you see in a glossy food magazine. The water stayed clear and I could follow my egg cooking progress and pull it out the moment it was done.

This pre-boil step adds only a few seconds to the usual poaching method, and time well spent. Anyone with problems with thin squirrels floating away is sure to benefit from this pre-poaching. One word of warning: don’t leave during the ten second boil. I know waiting seems obvious as ten seconds go by quickly, but I also know that multitasking is terribly tempting. A lot more than 30 seconds and the egg white will start to seize and cling to that inner membrane next to the shell and you will lose it when you break the egg. But if you can pause and give your full attention to the egg, then a ten-second boil is the ticket to your next great jam.