How to Properly Poach an Egg
Sadly, like eating well done steak, I ate chalky egg yolks for all my life. I never knew how awesome poached eggs were until I had them at my friend Anna’s house a few weeks ago. Perfectly cooked, the egg white should be solid and the egg yolk warmed through enough to roll down in a thick rich stream. And really, I don’t know why poaching eggs is considered a difficult task (I always assumed it was before I tried. It has such a reputation)! It’s probably because there are various known methods of poaching an egg, and two of them yield poor results. I have tested all three, and have made my conclusion as to which one is the best:
Before we go over the poaching methods, here are a few steps to poaching success, no matter which method you use:
-Use a fresh egg. If you use an older egg, all the different parts will have a harder time staying together.
-Crack the egg onto a small plate, then when you’re ready to poach the egg, hold the lip of the plate as close as you can to the water, and let it gently slip in.
-Always bring your water to a boil, then reduce to a steady simmer. Then proceed with poaching your egg.
-When boiling anything, it’s important to use enough boiling water. When you stick pasta in boiling water, do you notice that it stops boiling for a minute, and then needs another minute to come back up to a boil? When you add a bunch of mass (that isn’t hot) to boiling water, it significantly cools down that water. It’s the same with poaching an egg. Your cold egg will cool the boiling water too much if there isn’t enough of it. Use a pot big enough to hold lots of boiling water so the boiling water will always win against the egg. I use a deep saucepan with at least 3 inches of water.
Method investigation time!
The first method I tried is the vortex method. Basically, before you slip the egg in, you swirl the water around into a vortex. Here’s how that one turned out:
FAIL. It looks like an egg shooting star…except it’s not pretty. Yolk all to the side, with a bunch of streaming egg white mess coming out of it.
The second method I tried (and the one I have always done) is just slipping the egg in to the simmering water, no vortex. It turned out beautifully:
Success! Visible yolk, very even egg white, no whispy strands. Perfect. The only egg allowed to sit on top of my glorious biscuit.
The third method I tried is adding a splash of white vinegar to the water. The idea is to help coagulate the egg when it hits the water. Here’s what that looked like:
Eh, fail, but not as much as the first method. It’s just not as good as using plain water, so why waste the vinegar? You can barely see the yolk. But it’s not an awful poached egg.
The verdict: The simplest method wins (#2). Isn’t it funny that these things always seem to come back to the simplest way?
Now that we know what method to use, how long should you cook the egg? I always set my timer for exactly 2 minutes in simmering water. I find that to be the perfect amount of time to cook the egg white completely, and warm the egg yolk through.
Now you can go make poached eggs like a master! I let mine sit atop one of my Golden Crusted Fluffy Biscuits and garnish with chervil (a delicate herb, that goes beautifully with eggs) and some salt and pepper. The perfect breakfast!
Beautiful blog! I can’t wait to make the cupcakes with Earl grey frosting!
The only extra thing I do for egg-poaching ( I’m a FANATIC) is to slip them briefly onto a piece of paper towel before putting them on the toast/biscuit (love it)/whatever so they aren’t so slippery. And, chopped chervil -subtle and brilliant!
Thank you Niki! The earl grey cupcakes are fabulous! I love your egg poaching tip too, to soak up that excess water! Thanks for the tip!
I work in a restaurant and poached eggs used to be on our breakfast menu. Poaching under pressure, that was fun. Eggs are temperamental buggers sometimes.
I’ve never ever poached an egg before, so I think I shall try it for dinner with a lightly toasted piece of wheat bread. To tired today to make biscuits at the moment.
How’d it go? I love just having a simple egg with a few sides for dinner!
My family has been using a pseudo-poaching method for years for our Eggs on Toast breakfasts. With 6 kids in the family it was difficult to get all the eggs in and out in a timely way using traditional poaching methods. Here’s what we do:
Use a non-stick pan or spray pam-type oil onto pan; crack the eggs into the pan while it’s still cold – try to get them as evenly spaced as possible; gently pour water into the pan (in between a couple of eggs) until the water just covers the tops of the eggs; cover the pan & turn on the stove burner to med-high; it’s easiest with a glass lid, you can watch the water to see how it’s boiling. The water will boil & sticky bubbles will cover the eggs. When that happens the eggs are done. With an aluminum lid, it’s more a matter of figuring out how long your instruments take to get the job done.
The best part about using this method is that you can time your toast so it’s still warm & just buttered when the eggs get done.
Very cool! Thanks for sharing this tip with everyone!
to use the vortex method you ideally need a tall deep saucepan to allow 6″ of water depth,get egg ready in a small cup(easier to handle than a plate in confined spaces) use a long spoon to create a strong vortex and the add egg gently into the eye of the tornado,if it’s fresh(the egg)it should sink down slow enough for the albumin to swirl around the yolk and start to set in a teardrop shape,after 30 secs it can be removed and put in to iced water to stop the cooking process, repeat this step until you have enough eggs for your needs,then when you need them,assemble the dish and at last minute drop eggs back into a pan off boiling water for 2 mins to heat through and serve,amaze your many breakfast/dinner party guests with your amazing all cooked perfect and at the same time..
I always ate poached eggs at my grandma’s house. The way she did it was to crack the egg into a skillet, then let it cook until the white is cooked slightly. Then, take the lid of the skillet, add a little bit of water on the other side of the skillet (opposite the egg), then quickly put the lid over the skillet. This allows the steam to cook the yolk slightly, without cooking it all the way through. This is the way I’ve always done it, so maybe it’s a weird thing my family does? Good to see the other methods, though!
Hi Emily, very cool! I have never heard of that method, sounds like the steam from the water cooks the egg. Grandma’s do know some pretty awesome tricks =)
Sorry! Love your blog, but trying to poach eggs without a speck of vinegar, is just totally against
every basic cooking norm by professionals!