The Art of Poaching an Egg

For a long time I have struggled with poaching eggs. I actually felt uneasy at the thought of it, probably because I was so bad at cooking them this way! It was my Dad's job and he did it really, really well so I shied away and never learnt the task until most recently, when I finally decided to 'man-up' and learn this skill. It really is a technique that one needs to master in life, and for me it has taken 15 or so years and I still don't get it right every time.

I have tried many an attempt at different techniques:

1. Egg in Glad Wrap

Method: Lining a small round dish with glad wrap and cracking the egg into it to create a case, poaching the egg in a frying pan of simmering water until cooked... like so:

Result: This worked seemingly well. Although the egg tended to cook very well on the bottom and not so much on the top so I then proceeded to attempt to dunk the bagged egg with the spoon, so it was submerged into the water, which resulted in an overcooked egg but which easily came out of the glad wrap. 

Recommendation: Attempt this again with boiling water rather than simmering and potentially in a deeper smaller pot.

2. Microwave

Method: Cracking the egg into a small ramekin-style dish, pricking the egg yolk and white a few times with a toothpick and cooking in the microwave in 10 second slots until the egg appears to be cooked. 

Result: BEWARE! The egg may explode with a bomb-like sound from the microwave, resulting in an eggy mess and one hell of a fright! Alternatively the egg may be cooked on the outside but not so on the inside. Continuing to cook the egg results often in overcooking but still with a runny gooey like substance around the centre... this technique does often work quite well and is mostly a quick cheats way to poach an egg. 

Recommendation: Monitor the cooking of the egg like its life or death, and sometimes you may need to grease the ramekin or add in a bit of water to stop the egg from sticking to the dish.

3. Boiling

Method: Bringing a large pot of water to the boil, adding a decent lug of vinegar (I've actually found cider vinegar to be quite good), break egg in to small ramekin sized bowl, and pour swiftly into the water with bowl almost touching the water. Continue to boil the egg until the egg raises to the top of the water, remove with a slotted spoon and serve...

Result: Note to self - be careful to not burn your hand on the boiling water which results in a fright, causing one to jump and then spill the egg all over the element. 

I haven't managed to find the most accurate time for the cooking of the egg in this way but I have decided that you must remove it as soon as it rises to the top. If you don't do this it will most likely not be runny in the middle, which is not my idea of a good poached egg, like this: 

Still tasty, but not ideal...

Recommendation: The key is to remove the egg immediately after it rises with a slotted spoon to drain the excess water, your egg should come out at perfection with a deliciously gooey centre, like so:

Do you have a better way of poaching an egg? If so leave a comment and let me know, would love to try out some more tricks but at this stage number 3 is a clear winner! Good luck and get poaching!!!