Eggcellent

If you remember from my second post, hard boiling eggs really riles me up. Every time they tear, break, membranes stick. I end up with half the egg thrown out with the shell. It wasn't always like this. I remember years and years of happy egg boiling. Then one day it all changed. I've always blamed the eggs.

My mother-in-law gave us a microwave wave cooker. To say I am skeptical is an understatement. On Saturday my wife popped four eggs into this gadget, zapped it in the microwave and then dashed off to her mom's leaving me to figure out what to do with it. I figure it sat on the counter for a good 15 minutes before I got around to it. I plucked the four eggs out, nearly burning myself, they were like hot stones, and shoved them in the fridge door.

A couple hours later, home alone, I'm scanning through the fridge and my eyes stumble on the eggs. They're cool now of course. I grab one. What the heck. If Dinah want's them for egg salad I can always cook more.

It peeled perfectly.

Impossible! What the?

I grabbed another one.

Perfect.

Impossible!!!

Both were perfect. Think AJ. What's different? More importantly, what is the same about this microwave gizmo that is the same as back in the good ol' days when hard boiled eggs didn't stress me out?

nearly burning myself, they were like hot stones, and shoved them in the fridge

Somewhere I read that you are supposed to quench the cooked eggs in an ice bath to stop them from cooking. This prevents a sulfur reaction that causes the yolks to discolor. I never had an issue with gray rimmed yolks but I want to do things correctly so I started quenching my eggs in ice water. I never connected any dots.

I had to quickly test my theory. I grabbed the four remaining eggs, tossed in my super-duper-color-changing egg timer and boiled on high like the good old days. When my timer turned purple all the way through, I poured out the water and put the eggs in the fridge to cool.

I waited, impatiently, a couple of hours and grabbed the first one.

It peeled perfectly.

Impossible! Amazing!

I gave the next one a few more hours to cool just to be sure.

Again perfect.

I was so excited I jumped on my motorcycle and ran to the grocery to buy more eggs (luckily it was 55°F and sunny).

I saved the other two for the next day just to be sure. Again perfect. All four were perfect!

So my conspiracy theory was wrong, the eggs haven't changed. It was me all along. I wonder what else is like that?