The Perfect Poached Egg

I recently had a fabulous day at one of the UK’s best cook schools – one that isn’t a million miles away from my home in Callander, Scotland!

The day covered some of the basics. What equipment you will need, how to use it and most importantly some great tips and ideas to impress in the kitchen – cooking the Perfect Poached Egg.

The Egg

You need very fresh eggs that have the maximum albumen to support the yolk. Apparently as eggs age the albumen breaks down ,so the professional advice is to use Barn Eggs (humanely but intensively reared).Free range eggs won’t cut the mustard as their age will vary a little depending on the frequency of collection.

The Technique

Assemble your equipment – you will need a deep pan, espresso cup, slotted spoon and a pair of kitchen scissors!

Bring a pan of unsalted water – we used fabulous All-Clad – to the boil

Add plenty of vinegar (clear not malt) – this acts as a setting agent on the albumen

Break your egg into a small espresso cup ready to pour into the water.

Stir the water to a vortex and add the egg from the cup – remove the pan from the heat to ensure that the water doesn’t boil too vigorously and break up the albumen as it cooks.

As soon as the albumen is cooked enough to support the yolk (about 3 minutes) remove the egg with your slotted spoon and place in a jug of cold water

You can then trim the loose, wispy albumen from your egg to show off the perfect tear drop shape of YOUR perfectly poached egg.

Finally simply reheat your egg (roughly 2-3 minutes) in slightly salted boiling water when needed for your dish. Professional chefs will prepared their eggs several hours before, store in cold water and then reheat and serve when needed.

Practice

If at first you don’t succeed ….

On our day at the Cook School we were given three eggs. My result was one decent attempt and two eggs in the bin. I suggest a couple of dozen eggs and an hours dedicated practice. Its how the professional chefs learn their trade and you can not after all make an omelette without cracking a few eggs!

Good luck !

Guy