Thursday, June 24, 2010

Hard-boiled eggs in a microwave

I found instructions at eHow for making hard-boiled eggs in a microwave. I tried it this morning, and it worked!

The tl;dr version of the steps is

  1. fill bowl with enough water to cover eggs
  2. remove eggs
  3. bring water to a boil
  4. carefully place eggs in hot water
  5. cover with a plate and cook on low power for 8 minutes
  6. let stand for another 6-8 minutes

I cooked the eggs in a GE Profile JES2251SJ microwave. I unintentionally left out the salt and vinegar. I cooked four eggs, and it took the water about 4 minutes to come to the initial boil. This particular model has power settings from 1 to 10, and I used setting 2 on the fifth step. The instructions say the plate is for limiting the mess in case an egg explodes, but I used an upside-down paper plate. I doubt it would have been great for containment.

After all this, I poured out the hot water and ran cold water over the eggs a couple of times. Then I added ice and waited a few minutes for them to cool off.

At this point, I was relieved that none of the eggs had exploded, but—as you might imagine—I was worried that I hadn't cooked them enough. I picked up the first, and it felt pretty solid. Then a gentle tap-tap-tap. No runny mess!

The yolks were well done, but the whites were a touch runny in places on the outside. Next time, I'll either try a slightly less-low low-power setting or let the eggs stand a bit longer.