How To: Hard boil eggs for beginners

The egg is an incredible compact, nutrition, protein and fat all in one prepackaged unit. This video will show you how to boil an egg using a strainer basket in your boiling water to heat steam your eggs as an alternative to regular boiling.

1. Place the eggs gently in an empty pot. If you accidentally crack an egg, adding salt or vinegar to the water may help the proteins in the egg white coagulate faster to plug the cracks in the shell.

2. Fill the pot with enough cold tap water to cover the eggs completely, with about 1 inch (3 cm) of water over them. Use cold water to help keep the eggs from overcooking, even though it increases cooking times.

3. Be careful not to add too much!

Add enough salt to make the water taste salty. This can make the eggs easier to peel because, as mentioned earlier, the proteins coagulate and firm up, making the white easier to separate from the shell. Also, eggs that are less fresh are easier to peel because their higher pH strengthens the membrane. (This can be simulated by making the cooking water more alkaline with a half teaspoon of baking soda per quart of water.)

4. Once the water boils...

Put on a lid. Bring the water to the point of boiling, over high heat. From here, there are two main schools of thought regarding how to get a perfectly hard boiled egg. The following method assumes you started with cold, refrigerated eggs. See the video below for the other method.

Remove from heat, then cover the pan.

As soon as the water boils, turn off the heat, but keep the pot on the warm stove. Do not remove the lid. Leave the eggs in the hot water for ten to fifteen minutes.