Easy Peel Hard Boiled Egg Secrets
But my eggs never peel right! It’s such a hassle! What’s the secret to Easy Peel Hard Boiled Eggs?
First of all, if you’re starting with eggs in cold water, just stop. It doesn’t work. Nor does baking soda or any other tricky-dicky method you’ve found on Pinterest. Here’s the best way, from someone who has made five-million hard-boiled eggs (give or take):
How to Make Easy Peel Hard Boiled Eggs
- Start with your oldest eggs. Usually the ones from a local grocery are plenty old enough to make good hard-boiled eggs, but if you’re getting yours delivered fresh from a farm, you’ll want to let those sit for a few days first.
- Let your eggs sit out on the counter for a few hours or overnight. You want them to be close to room temperature.
- Fill a large saucepan (I always make at least a dozen at a time) about half full of hot water and start heating on the stove. You want it to boil. No need to add salt or anything else.
- Once the water boils, lower each egg in with a slotted spoon, dunking halfway for 2 seconds, then lowering gently to the bottom. You want the air pressure inside the egg to have just a few seconds to equalize through the shell. But if it cracks, no worries, just leave it be. A little white will leak out, but most often, you still get a perfectly serviceable egg.
- Once all the eggs are in, set your timer. Pay attention to your altitude. If you’re at sea level, the boiling temperature will be higher than here in Denver, so your boiling time will be shorter. Here, I boil for about 14 minutes, but at sea level, lower that to 12. Just a minute or two can make all the difference between hard, mealy, green-tinged yolks, and moist, bright yellow ones. Best to err on the lower side.
- Once the timer goes, drain the eggs and run cold tap water over them for a minute or two, until the water in the pan feels cold to the touch. Don’t be afraid to be rough with them – cracking the shells just gets more cold water inside, and that’s a good thing.
- Let the eggs sit in the water for 30 minutes. This is really important.
- When you’re ready to peel, take an egg and rap the fatter end hard on the side of the sink. Peel a piece off the fat end, making sure you’ve removed the thin membrane that covers the egg. Gently start squeezing the egg round and round to open a gap between the shell and the white. Under running water, keep squeezing and let the water get inside. Once it’s loose, just peel it off. Make sure you get all the membrane off the egg. (If you don’t like keeping the water running, just have a large bowl of water handy in the sink and do it all under water.)
If you’re still skeptical about my method, check out this great video for the reasoning why starting with cold water is a terrible idea:
With practice, you’ll be peeling a dozen eggs in about 4 minutes or so, and they’ll all come out as clean as can be. You’ll still get a clunker now and then, but not very often!
