About The Whole Egg Boiling Thing

If you're a regular you'll know that I'm trying to learn to cook, out of necessity and desire. I've got to a level now of having about ten things in my repertoire. Hardly the standard of Indyana or someone but I'm reasonably pleased with the progress.

So far I've concentrated on the things that I consider as essentials; chicken curry, beef and potato curry, dhal and then a few dishes that the girls will happily eat. There's a couple of western dishes in the armoury for me too, just in case I have a sudden inexplicable desire to eat something bland.

I'm struggling with some of the basics though and the other night there was some fun and games involving eggs, a prawn curry and me. Here's the score.

I'd made a prawn curry on Wednesday evening. It was a spur of the moment move, I'd opted to cook for me rather than to eat the bolognese or chilli con carne thing that I'd cooked up for the girls. I say bolgnese or chillie con carne because they're not really that different, there's just a can of kidney beans and some cumin that separates them to be honest.

Quantity isn't one of my chosen fields. I can cook stuff but most of it is made in enough quantity to feed a medium sized town. The balance of flavours is invariably ok, but the amount of food prepared is always sufficient for a few days more. The prawn curry was no exception to this. I gorged myself silly with it and was left with at least enough for another meal.

Thursday night was going to be the second night, I claculated that the addition of a hard boiled egg would fill out the curry, making plenty for a hearty dinner.

That's when I found out about boiling eggs the hard way. Or rather that's when I didn't find out, because it's quite hard, and they don't teach you about it on the cookery programmes.

I boiled some water, remembering to leave the egg in the water. Then, when the water started to boil, I turned it down a bit and set my vastly over priced but highly trendy kitchen timer to about 5 minutes and waited. As the bell pinged I took the egg out of the water and attempted my new method of peeling an egg, as seen on Jamie Oliver a few weeks ago. I used to like Jamie Oliver, particularly with him being a drummer and all. After trying his egg peeling thing I can only conclude that he must be a guitarist, there's no other explanation. Or just a tosser.

On one of his programmes he showed this way of peeling an egg that took about 2 seconds. It involved holding the egg with your hand clenched and then smashing the egg downwards in your fist, then rolling your fist backwards and forwards on the work surface. It's a bit hard to describe but the theory is that you end up with and egg and some shell that comes away from the egg in a matter of seconds.

We all know about "in theory". I tried it and ending up with runny egg all over my fingers and a work surface that looked like one of those griddles in a fast food place. There were bits of egg shell floating everywhere and I was getting the firm idea that this egg wasn't going anywhere near my mouth. Some people might take a blinkered view of this and say that blame should lie at my door for not cooking the egg for long enough. I say that's rubbish and kick the blame firmly in the direction of Mr Oliver.

I cleared up the mess, runny egg white, tepid yolk and shell. All went in the bin and I started the boiling thing again. Sparing no expense I went for a fresh egg, the recycling brigade would have a heart attack at the thought but I was in a generous mood. I threw the egg in the water and set the timer to 6 minutes, an extra minute should ensure that the egg would be suitably hard boiled.

The timer pinged, I took out the egg and went for the "Jamie". There was more confidence and a bit of swagger in my approach. I thought that I needed to go for it, the extra minute would take care of the egg and the firmness of touch as I banged the egg in fist on the work surface would help with the peeling.

In theory.

Seconds later I was mopping up another runny and eggy mess from my kitchen worktop. A chap can love an egg but times like this are testing ones indeed. I abandoned the egg in the prawn curry plan, the prawns on their own were fine tasting and eggs just weren't going to do it for me. Of course I realised that the problem was because I'd hurled the egg in the already boiling water, I hadn't put it in cold water and started from scratch.

I'm not sure on this egg boiling business. Anyone know how to do it?