I love a good kitchen hack. Little tricks that make kitchen chores easier are a big win in my book. Recently I was Googling around for variations on egg salad sandwich. Not for the blog; I was just wanting to make one and was sort of bored of my usual method. That's when I saw a few links that said you could hard boil eggs in the oven.
What?!?! Does that work? Is it weird? Is this an Internet trick or the real deal?
Obviously I had to try it out.
I read a couple different sites but ended up basically following this method. You place eggs into a muffin pan. I baked a whole dozen because I was optimistic, but if you don't use all the cups, you can fill the unused ones half full with water so they don't warp as you bake (I also do this when I have one left over from a muffin recipe that just doesn't quite make enough batter).
Bake at 350°F for 30 minutes. Once I removed them from the oven, I immediately plunged them into a bowl of ice water and let them sit for 10 minutes.
Then I peeled off the shells. Some articles suggested that this method would make it easier to peel off the shells, but I thought it was basically the same as the traditional hard boiled method.
But, what I did love about this was my kitchen was significantly less, uh, smelly. You can always tell when someone is hard boiling eggs, as it has a very distinct (and sort of unpleasant) smell. Baking them in the oven definitely reduced the smell, so that was nice.
One thing I noticed was that a few of my eggs had dark brown spots. I think this was a result of where the egg touched the muffin pan while baking. It didn't change the taste, but the texture in these dark spot areas was different. But they were so small that it was easy to just slice off that small bit. Next time I'm going to try rotating the eggs halfway through baking.
Success! And now for egg salad sandwich. I also LOVE to top salads with hard boiled eggs. As a mostly vegetarian, eggs are a great source of protein for me. Thanks for letting me share! xo. Emma
Credits // Author and Photography: Emma Chapman. Photos edited with A Beautiful Mess actions.
35 Comments
cool trick, but boiling eggs is so easy, takes half the time, and doesn’t leave brown marks… so, yeah…
Game changer! 🙂
Warm Regards,
Alexandra
http://www.littlewildheart.com
I ate in the Middle East baked eggs totally brown. More tasty and a bit of a different consistency
This seems like such a silly waste of time . Surely it would costs more to preheat the oven then cook the eggs …but if you are any thing like myself you would have had to try it just to see.
I think I’ll be sticking to normal methods
C x
Awesome trick!!
http://everythingsalwayssunny.com
Kristin xx
I do this with mini muffin tins – the shells will get some spots but haven’t had spots on the eggs. Maybe the mini tin makes a difference from the regular size tin? I have no idea, but it’s worth a try…
That looks awesome !! 😉
http://inspiremeland.com
Emma
I suspect that you use up considerably more electricity with your oven on pre-heat and then for 30 minutes that you would use up in boiling the eggs for 10 minutes.
ha! It’s does take less time to boil them, I agree. I’d say the advantage here was that I could just leave them for 30 minutes and go do something else (or be cooking on the stove top). Also, the smell was greatly reduced with baking vs boiling. I have a small kitchen that is connected to my dining “room” and living room so reducing the egg smell is a big help. But yeah, I think both methods are great in different ways. 🙂
-Emma
Great tip-thanks for sharing!
-Emma
I would bet you’re correct, although I’m really not sure.
I do know that growing up my dad would never have let me do this method in the summer, with the air conditioning turned on. If the air was on we were not allowed to use the oven. I think that’s partly why no-bake cookies are one my favorites. 🙂
-Emma
I have a fail proof way to do eggs. Place eggs in pot of cold water covering the eggs completely. Bring to a boil. As son as they boil, turn off the heat, cover with lid and leave for 15 minutes. Run cold water over and then let sit in cold water in the smae pan till cool. NEVER a dark ring and always perfectly hard boiled.
oooh interesting.
Now, I am only using one method to hard «boil» my eggs: I steam them ! so easy to do.
Good trick! The smell is definitely a reason why I don’t make these very often, so this is for sure something I shall try!
I think the no smell is a huge advantage – my boyfriend always gives me grief about the smell of my HB eggs! He’s one of those people who can only eat eggs before 10am haha, so this would be win win. Also, I boil my eggs for 1-2 min then let stand, another advantage of this method would be that you don’t have to stand by the stove the whole time. Thanks for testing out!
http://www.champagneforeveryday.com/
This method is also super helpful/easy if you need to make a lot of eggs! You don’t have to use a ton of water or a huge pot 🙂
I used this technique when I worked for a soup kitchen in Lancaster, PA. We received a huge donation of eggs, and wanted to get them into the hands of our guests as quickly and efficiently as possible. Rather than boiling huge pans of water I found a similar recipe for hard-baked eggs and the rest, as they say, is history!
Cute trick!
If you are looking for something different for your normal egg salad recipe, I add dill and smoked paprika to my mix! Give it a try! Xo
http://www.reckonandrevel.com
This method will be great when we need lots of hard boiled eggs, for a party or family dinner, etc…its easy and need almost no watching over every few mins… but might not serve well for every day usage though, boiling water is my go-to.. thanks for sharing..
xo
Hems
agoldentulip.blogspot.com
ahh i have to try this!!
xx nikki
http://www.dream-in-neon.com
That sandwich looks AMAZING!
This is genius, I definitely want to try it!
The easiest way to make HB eggs is with a pressure cooker if you have one. Cold eggs go into the pot – on a wire platform, under which you pour about a cup of boiling water. Set the pressure cooker for 5 minutes. When it gets to pressure, depress it and cool the eggs quickly under cold water. The shells practically FALL off !!
To test with your pressure cooker, try one egg first! The timing will be the same for one or a dozen
Wow I’d never heard of that before! Can’t wait to try it out, and I totally agree about the smell of boiling eggs.. Thank you for sharing 🙂
Liefs
Yara
I had wondered if this really worked. I have had it on my pinterest board for a good while now. Now I will try it!
Interesting!
This is perfect to throw them in the oven when you’re already making something else! Time and energy saver!!!
I adore this idea! Seems so much simpler and faster! (My oven heats way faster than water boils!)
I use a silicone mini muffin pan so no more dark spots (and no more rust spots in my good mini muffin pan). Stovetop may be faster but this is a “set it and forget it”!
I love this method. I use a damp cloth between the muffin tin and eggs (careful not to burn the clothe) in order to avoid burning the eggs.
Ah I don’t have oven but this is so tricky! That egg salad sandwich is beautiful, can I ask for the recipe? or I just toss the eggs and lettuce into the sandwich? 😛 thanks for sharing emma!
xoJane
JANE FROM THE BLOG
Boiling water in a pot uses significantly less energy than heating the whole oven.. maybe if you were already using the oven (roasting veggies, baking a cake) you could justify this though?
Yum! I’ve never tried this method before but If i can reduce that eggy smell from hardboiling eggs the normal way i’ll try it! Usually every week i crack a few eggs into a muffin pan and bake them for about 20-25 min and then refrigerate them for easy breakfast sandwiches with english muffins!
Great idea cos it’s so hard to boil eggs in a pan!