Yolks.
Runny yolks.
Ick.
I only wanted hard scrambled eggs. The exception was egg sandwiches with over hard eggs and half a bottle of ketchup. I didn't even like hard boiled eggs, although I sort of liked deviled eggs. I would eat poached eggs but only if the yolk was golf ball hard.
I've cooked so many eggs in my time as a breakfast cook. People are fussy about their eggs. Since it's often the first thing they eat in the morning you can ruin someone's day if you get it wrong. It is extremely easy to get it wrong. I don't remember anyone ever ordering soft boiled eggs but one woman regularly ordered one hard boiled. She picked out the yolk and ate it with mustard. Or maybe she ate the white. I forget.
In the kitchen where I first learned to cook the chef taught me how to do omelets in the French tradition, which included being a little on the runny side. We usually stuck the pan under the salamander or in the oven to heat what ever the filling was, or just melt cheese. The eggs would set up a bit but were still too runny for me.
Years later I was in a restaurant about to have brunch. There was a soft boiled egg with bacon and toast points on the menu. It captured my imagination. Felt sentimental. Like an homage to Poppop. I was already scrambling my eggs softer and even hard boiling in less time to allow a softer inside. I wasn't as squeamish about runny yolks. A poached egg on a salad with a soft yolk was a creamy revelation.
That was one of the best breakfasts I've ever had. Delicate. Almost ceremonial with the dunking of the toast points. I vowed to get myself an egg cup and try it home.
Years went by.
In the first few years at the nest I saw an ad for an egg cup from Fiestaware. Purple, no less.
I bought it and it sat around for another few years. Eventually I pushed myself to use it. I needed to look up how to soft boil an egg. The irony of this is HUGE. I have flipped and scrambled and hard boiled sososososo many eggs. There was a logic to it but I felt the need to for instruction. I watched videos and read descriptions. I have the perfect size pan. And so I tentatively dropped my first egg into the boiling water.
After a certain amount of trial and error I have arrived at my system. I cook the egg for five minutes. There are so many things that can impact the perfection of the egg. How rolling is the boil. How cold is the egg when you drop it. How long does the egg sit before you break into it. It even took me awhile to realize that it was easier to eat with a spoon. These soft boiled eggs are no joke.
And yet my Grandma made countless numbers of them for her husband. I don't remember anyone else in the family eating them. I think I remember a wind up kitchen timer. I remember his eggcup sitting on the window sill.
