Yeah it’s the first line in the intro and I can’t think of an interpretation of “funniest” that works in the context.
> Eggs are one of the most valuable foods on the tables of consumers and in the kitchens of chefs due to their abundant functional properties that make them the funniest and most versatile ingredients to work with.
Yeah it's got to be translation error -- "funnest" and "funniest" are the same in many languages and I've seen this mistake before. "Funnest" would also be strange here but I guess they mean "most enjoyable"
The unwavering commitment to the thoroughness of the investigation really makes this bit work. "So you think this is a frivolous topic?" the authors seem to be saying; "well, let us show you just how seriously we can take it."
I use a similar but simpler technique to cook eggs to a runny soft boiled by cracking eggs directly into a small quantity of boiling water. This sets the whites quickly but drops the temperature of the water before it can set the yolks. It's kind of like lazy poaching.
"periodic eggs were placed alternatively in boiling water (Th = 100 °C) for th = 2 min and water at Tc = 30 °C for tc = 2 min, for a total cooking time of 32 minutes, which corresponds to the repetition of the hot and cold cycles for a total of N = 8 times. In the case of periodic eggs, a bowl filled with water kept at 30 °C was used for the cold cooking cycle."
I might try this later. The image looks like a great ramen egg.
Clearly you should turn your kitchen into a gentle pressure vessel. It will make cooking so much easier.
I think you could also just salt the water? That should raise the boiling temperature and hopefully it doesn't seep into the egg, though I think eggs can use some seasoning!
My rough calcs estimate you would need about 400mg of salt per ml of water to get a 7°C boiling point increase, but the max solubility of salt in 100°C water is 384mg/ml, so you might just get there with a supersaturated solution.
Hmm, so to get a 12.5ºF dT with water and NaCl we need about 6.7 mol salt per kg water [1]. That's almost 400 g/kg, more than 10x the salinity of seawater.
I can soft boil eggs for ramen in about 4-6 minutes of time but it requires using ice water to immediately cool the eggs down so they do not continue to cook after removing the eggs from the boiling water.
The 8 cycles between boiling and room temp would be tedious without automation. I wonder if a similar outcome would be achieved by sous vide followed by boiling briefly to set the white, much like sous vide steak followed by searing.
> 8 cycles between boiling and room temp would be tedious without automation
Sounds like there is room in the market for a periodic sous vide device. Can't get around pumps. But maybe it's a two-piece device, with a heating element for the hot tank (use your own pot)-- the user is responsible for putting ice in the cold talk (use your own pot)-- and a hoses and pump assembly to dump and drain to and from the cooking tank (use your own pot).
I guess the tankless system isn't the MVP. A two-egg cooker is. Two tanks, one the user fills with ice, the other which contains a thermometer and heating element, and a small cooking tank with circulation and a powerful pump (expensive bit) to quickly dump and drain.
Metal shouldn’t break intact eggs and is easier to clean, more durable and less likely to leach nasties into your food [1].
Is there a way to determine egg temperature or doneness from outside? Like an acoustic or other feedback loop that lets the device tailor to the egg at hand.
I mean, probably it shouldn't, but I'm worried about thin wires in a basket concentrating the force from the eggs getting jostled. Fair point about leaching, though.
Depends on the room. We take (for HW engineering tests) a value of 25°C +/- 5°K. Reflects the reality during summer with AC at max speed or with window open.
Another method is to mix the yolk and albumen within the shell, and hard boil that as normal. Then you get a hard boiled scrambled egg with no albumen/yolk divide.
I do this by rapidly spinning the egg before cooking. Works well for my kids who always would eat the white but not the yolk, no matter what texture I got it.
Quite good. Easy to peel as well. Only slightly inconvenient to make. Once we get a universal household servant androids, I’m definitely going to ask mine to make my eggs this way.
39 comments
[ 0.12 ms ] story [ 96.4 ms ] threadVery odd and somewhat amusing phrasing - presumably due to translation error? I'm assuming they meant 'most enjoyable' rather than 'funniest'.
> Eggs are one of the most valuable foods on the tables of consumers and in the kitchens of chefs due to their abundant functional properties that make them the funniest and most versatile ingredients to work with.
I might try this later. The image looks like a great ramen egg.
Well nuts, at my altitude water boils at 93ºC. It doesn't appear there is a (known) closed-form solution to this problem, unfortunately :P.
I think you could also just salt the water? That should raise the boiling temperature and hopefully it doesn't seep into the egg, though I think eggs can use some seasoning!
Can sous-vide machines hold 100°C in oil?
Hmm, so to get a 12.5ºF dT with water and NaCl we need about 6.7 mol salt per kg water [1]. That's almost 400 g/kg, more than 10x the salinity of seawater.
Pressure-vessel kitchen it is.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boiling-point_elevation#Ebulli... i = 2, Kb = 0.93°F kg/mol
[a] That 6.7 ml/kg is technically a molality, something I only point out because it's a silly-sounding word
Sounds like there is room in the market for a periodic sous vide device. Can't get around pumps. But maybe it's a two-piece device, with a heating element for the hot tank (use your own pot)-- the user is responsible for putting ice in the cold talk (use your own pot)-- and a hoses and pump assembly to dump and drain to and from the cooking tank (use your own pot).
I guess the tankless system isn't the MVP. A two-egg cooker is. Two tanks, one the user fills with ice, the other which contains a thermometer and heating element, and a small cooking tank with circulation and a powerful pump (expensive bit) to quickly dump and drain.
Metal shouldn’t break intact eggs and is easier to clean, more durable and less likely to leach nasties into your food [1].
Is there a way to determine egg temperature or doneness from outside? Like an acoustic or other feedback loop that lets the device tailor to the egg at hand.
[1] https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10499202/
Depends on the room. We take (for HW engineering tests) a value of 25°C +/- 5°K. Reflects the reality during summer with AC at max speed or with window open.
I do this by rapidly spinning the egg before cooking. Works well for my kids who always would eat the white but not the yolk, no matter what texture I got it.