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Eggs Cooked Without Boiling
By this very simple process eggs are said to be lighter and better adapted to delicate stomachs than by the old and general plan of boiling. Proceed as follows. Heat a basin with boiling water till it is thoroughly hot; then throw off the water and put the eggs to be cooked into it, moving them round so that every part shall receive the heat. Have ready a kettle of boiling water, pour this over the eggs, and cover the basin to prevent any steam from escaping. In twelve minutes they will be perfectly cooked.
A coddling method rather than a recipe: the eggs cook in water that is off the heat and falling in temperature, which sets the white gently instead of toughening it. Two details in the original are doing all the work.
- The hinge is the pre-heated basinIf the bowl is cold it will pull enough heat out of the water to leave the whites slippery. Fill it with boiling water, let it stand a minute, tip it out, and only then add the eggs. A thick pottery or Pyrex bowl holds heat far better than thin glass or metal.
- "A basin"In this book a basin is a deep mixing bowl, not a sink. Choose one only a little larger than the eggs so the water covers them by an inch or so and there is little air space above.
- "A kettle of boiling water"Water at a full rolling boil, poured immediately. Use enough to cover the eggs well; too little water cools too fast to set the yolk edge.
- Cover it, and do not peekThe lid or plate matters as much as the boiling water. Lifting it to check part-way lets steam and heat go and slows the cooking.
- Start the eggs at room temperatureModern refrigerated eggs are much colder than the larder eggs assumed here. Straight from the fridge they will lag behind the twelve minutes given; let them sit out first, or allow some extra time.
- What twelve minutes gives youA just-set, custardy white and a thick but still soft yolk — closer to a French oeuf mollet than to a hard-boiled egg. For a firmer yolk, leave them longer; because the water cools steadily rather than staying at the boil, the yolk is less likely to go chalky and green than in a hard boil.
- ServingCracked into a cup with butter, salt and pepper, or in the shell in an egg cup. The set is too soft for slicing or for stuffed eggs.
The claim that unboiled eggs are "lighter and better adapted to delicate stomachs" belongs to a long Victorian preoccupation with invalid cookery, which occupied whole chapters of nineteenth-century household manuals. Digestibility was often explained by the coagulation of albumen: a white driven hard by a rolling boil was held to be tough and slow to digest, while one set gently in cooling water stayed tender. The physiology was rough, but the observation was sound han above roughly 180F, egg white toughens and weeps. The same reasoning produced the coddled egg, the egg beaten into hot milk, and the barley-water-and-egg drinks prescribed for the sick.