Not to be dramatic but I think that boiling eggs should be considered an art form. There is so much masterful precision, so much work behind the scenes of creating the perfect boiled egg according to your own preferences. It’s a feat of engineering.
Especially if you like hard boiled eggs. How do you know they’re absolutely done? How do you know you’re definitely getting the favoured lovely yellow firm yolk in the middle and not that shade of grey?
Maybe I’m just a bad cook but I just think it is a very delicate procedure!
However, it turns out that there is a way to know an egg is hard-boiled without cracking the shell and all you need is your fingertip.
How to tell an egg is hard-boiled without cracking it
According to scientists performing an egg-periment at Newcastle University, it all comes down to the simple act of spinning eggs (or, if you’re a little butter-fingered, asking somebody else to).
So, first, you have to cook your egg. BBC Good Food recommends that if you want a classic hard-boiled egg with a “mashable but not dry and chalky” finish, you should boil your egg for 10 minutes.
Then, lay your egg on a flat surface and, according to the University, you simply give it a light spin and then gently place your finger on it to briefly stop it from spinning.
If your egg then continues to spin or even move a little, the contents inside are still runny. If it stays stopped, it’s hard-boiled.
The scientists explained: ” “When you spin the eggs, you spin their insides too. In the hard-boiled egg, the insides are fixed to the shell so it behaves as you would expect.
“In the raw egg, the insides continue to spin after you’ve stopped the shell. When you let go, the momentum of the spinning yolk carries the shell and the whole egg starts spinning again.”
Easy!