Tale Of Two Egg Cookers - Crazy Questions

[Jon B.]

 

I love hard boiled eggs.  Eat them all the time. A couple years ago, on one of the on-line cooking sites, I saw an electric counter top egg cooker that looked interesting.  Checked it out and found great reviews, so I bought it.

 It is a Chef's Choice, 7 egg electric egg cooker.  Have been using it for 2 years and it works great.  Pour in some water,  put in 7 eggs, set the degree of doneness, turn on the switch and 25 minutes later the alarm sounds and they are ready.

 

Simple, no timing issues, consistent results…….life is good!!!!!

 

This past Christmas a well intention'ed family member gave me a brand spanking new……………….Dash Deluxe 12 egg cooker.  

 

I was excited to have the ability to cook more eggs at one time but this cooker is challenging my logic of how things work in the universe.  Maybe one or more of our esteemed KK members can help me understand.

This new cooker only has an on-off switch.  It has an alarm that sounds when the eggs are done. 

The adjustments for doneness and the total number of eggs you cook is dependent how much water you place into the cooker.

 This is where my understanding issues begin.............. 

- If you cook 6 hard boiled eggs, you put in 5 oz. of water and it takes 18 minutes before the alarm sounds 

- If you cook 12 hard boiled eggs, you put in 3.5 oz. of water and it takes 20 minutes before the alarm sounds.

 In my lame brain logic………..with a single temperature setting on this unit……you should need more water for more eggs.  And why does less water take more time before the buzzer sounds????

Is it the density of the additional eggs that causes the cooker to take more time to cook them?????   Wouldn’t less water boil out/steam out sooner and then cause the cooker to just bake the eggs (like an oven)???    

Is it possible this new cooker is monitoring the internal temps in order to do the timing?  With the single temp setting on this cooker the water appears to boil/steams out at the same rate.  The upper rack of eggs are so far away from the heating plate and I can’t imagine the unit can sense them.  Plus the lid is thin plastic and would not transmit temperature to the base unit.   The base unit has to get hotter if the water is gone??????? 

In addition to the above questions….with this unit the instructions say to poke a hole in the bottom end of the egg (fat end) and place it upright in the cooker (comes with a pin to puncture the eggs).

Why poke a hole in the egg before cooking and why the fat end?????????  The other cooker doesn’t require that and the eggs turn out fine….with either the fat end or skinny up.  The hole in the cooked eggs doesn’t seem make any difference in the peeling process after you cool the eggs in ice water compared to the eggs from the other cooker.   So many questions!!!!!!!  

 

Maybe I should get a life and not ponder the whys & wherefore's of electric egg cookers but inquiring (sick) minds need to know!!!!!  

 

Thoughts….comments!!!!!     

Edited January 16, 2020 by Jon B.

[Tucker]

Wow; to much math and physics for me.

Try this:

To do hard "boiled" eggs; steam them.

use a vegetable steamer basket 

Set it in a 3 qt saucepan, filled w/ water to just below steamer basket, bring water to boil.

18 eggs in, stacked up.

11-12 minutes later put into ice water, 10 min, then peel.

adjust your cook time to desired yolk done-ness, this time gives you firm, but not hard yolks.

we get perfect eggs everytime.

[Jon B.]

Thanks!   I take it from above......no lid on the sauce pan????

I have a steamer basket and will try this 😀

 

[Tucker]

oops, yes, lid the saucepan when bringing water to a boil and during cooking.

 

[tony b]

From the good ole internet:

Some people use a pin to make a small hole in the shell at the large end of the egg before they put the egg in the water. At the large end of each egg is a small air space. When you hard cook an egg, this air heats up, expands, and escapes through pores in the shell—but not before the egg white sets. This leaves the egg with a flattened end.

The best explanation that I could find for the decreasing amount of water being added when cooking more eggs was that the higher number of eggs increases the cold surface area inside the cooker, condensing the steam back to water, which drains back to the heating element to repeat the cycle until all the water/steam eventually escapes out the top as the eggs warm up/cook. So, with fewer eggs, more steam escapes early in the cooking process, so you need more water to start with to compensate for the added losses. 

[Pequod]

...and here I was expecting a discourse on BGE vs. Kamado Joe — two egg cookers.

[Basher]

Thanks Jon, I can't get myself that excited about boiling eggs.

Have you tried one of these? They have worked well for us.

[Tyrus]

I'm not sure how your egg peels when coming out of those particular cookers. A good friend was often bothered by this condition of the shell or skin sticking to the albumen (the white part) and ruining any presentation and for that matter, half the egg. So he looked up the perfect egg online and low and behold a recipe/method was provided. A little longer and a bit involved but, if your lookin for perfection another avenue awaits. You know Jon B, cooking an egg ain't as straight forward as it looks. 

[MacKenzie]

The older the egg the easier to peel. A fresh egg is very difficult to peel cleanly I'm sorry to say.

 

[tekobo]

@Jon B. I too love hard boiled eggs.  I think having the capacity to cook 12 at once would blow my mind!  One egg sliced, on toast with sardines works just fine for me. In fact, I think I need to have one of those very soon. A bit of added cheese wouldn't do any harm. Gross, I know.  

[tony b]

Cooking an egg properly is one of the hardest tasks in a kitchen. That's why many restaurants ask applicants to cook an egg as part of the interview. 

[MacKenzie]

All this talk of egg cooking pushed me to get out the pc and cook my breakfast egg.

Results-

Just the way I wanted it.

 

[Pequod]

Now THAT's an egg cooker. It's called @MacKenzie

[Jon B.]

2 minutes ago, Pequod said:

Now THAT's an egg cooker. It's called @MacKenzie

I could never afford that model egg cooker.   Too fancy!  😎 

[Tyrus]

Bacon and egg?  I prefer 3 or 4 but if they all look like that one You can cook em up for me anytime. I'll pass on the sardines and take on some capers instead. Good job Mac.  Strange habits them Brits have, must be something in the soil.

[SSgt93]

We use our Sous Vide to prepare eggs often and love it. Such a versatile cooking method. I enjoy eggs daily as well.


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[MacKenzie]

Speaking of sardines this is how I like mine.

 

[Tyrus]

Mac,.... come on, we all know your affection for fish. That is made of wood and with a couple of hooks you have a lure. Maybe if your lucky you could hook an octopus with that, have you tried Octopus,,,yum

[MacKenzie]

Not on your life, Tyrus. LOL

[tony b]

22 hours ago, SSgt93 said:

We use our Sous Vide to prepare eggs often and love it. Such a versatile cooking method. I enjoy eggs daily as well.


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MacKenzie and I experimented with poaching eggs in the Sous Vide circulator (multiple posts in the Sous Vide section of the Forum). The "classic method" gives perfect results, but just takes too long (50 minutes) and everything that we tried to shorten up the time, either gave us results we weren't happy with (overdone yolks or watery whites) or became cumbersome/complicated (multiple hot & ice water baths). I tried doing them in the InstaPot, but it's almost impossible to not overcook them, even if you release the steam immediately after it comes up to pressure. Consequently, I rarely make a poached egg anymore, opting for fried eggs instead, Spanish style (sunny side up, cooked in lots of olive oil and basted.)

Edited January 18, 2020 by tony b