Perfectly soft boiled eggs
- Lucy Lord
- Oct 7, 2022
- 2 min read
Updated: Jan 8
Straight into boiling water, start them in cold water, prick a hole in the bottom, don't prick a hole....who knew there was so much confusion around how to boil an egg? This video shares my step-by-step method that works every time.
Method
Fill a saucepan with water - enough water to cover the eggs by about 1 inch and bring it to the boil.
Turn off the heat, use a spoon to carefully place each egg in the just boiled water then turn the heat back on and up to a gentle rolling boil and immediately set your timer for the desired time (see below).
As soon as the timer is up, turn off to heat and carefully pour out the hot water into the sink, then immediately fill the pan up with cold water. Submerging the eggs in cold water stops them from continuing to cook (if it's a heavy pan or it's easier, you can remove the eggs 1-by-1 with a spoon into a large bowl of cold water).
Remove an egg from the cold water and gently tap on the kitchen surface so a small crack appears in the shell. Use your thumbs to peel away the rest of the shell. I do this over a piece of kitchen paper towel so it's easy to clean up. Repeat until all peeled, place back in the bowl of cold water to remove any small shell fragments.
Timings
6 minutes - mostly firm egg white with mostly liquid egg yolk
7 minutes - firm egg white with a jammy egg yolk
8 minutes - firm egg white, mostly firm egg yolk, still jammy in the centre yolk
9 minutes - firm egg white, mostly firm egg yolk
Anything under 6 minutes and the egg whites are still uncooked - 4 minutes are perfect for 'dippy' style eggs. Anything over 9 minutes is a hard boiled egg - great for making aheads for snacks, salads etc.
Nutritional Information
(per large egg)
72 calories
4.8g fat, 0g carbs, 6.3g protein
Good to know
You can store cooked eggs, peeled or unpeeled for up to 5 days in an airtight container. I like to place them on a folded piece of kitchen paper towel to absorb any excess moisture.
I use room temperature eggs.
Use eggs as fresh as possible as they're much easier to peel.
