Coddled eggs

Name: Coddled eggs
Prep time: 5 min
Cook time: 10 min
Total time: 15 min
Yield: 2
Cuisine: Britain
Ingredients: 4 large eggs; 10 g soft butter, plus a little for the ramekins; 2 pinches of salt; Black pepper and chopped chives, to finish; Toast, to serve

Eggs gently set in buttered ramekins in a covered water bath, with soft whites and thick, runny yolks.

Britain · Runny, Silky · Easy · Researched

Prep: 5 min
Cook: 10 min
Serves: 2

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Equipment

Deep saucepan with lid, at least 20 cm wide · 2 ramekins, about 150 ml each, or 2 egg coddlers · Folded tea towel or paper towels · Tongs · Kettle

Ingredients

4 large eggs
10 g soft butter, plus a little for the ramekins
2 pinches of salt
Black pepper and chopped chives, to finish
Toast, to serve

Method

Butter the ramekins

Boil a kettle of water. Rub the inside of each ramekin with butter; use one ramekin for every 2 eggs. Crack 2 eggs into each and add a pinch of salt. Put a small piece of the remaining butter on top.

Look for: Two whole eggs sit in each buttered ramekin.

Set up the water bath

Line the base of the saucepan with a folded tea towel or a double layer of paper towels so the ramekins don't sit directly on hot metal. Stand the ramekins on it. Pour in boiling water, avoiding the ramekins, until it comes about halfway up their sides.

Look for: Ramekins stand level on the towel; water reaches halfway up their sides.

Cover and cook gently

Put the lid on and cook over moderate heat for 9–10 minutes. If no steam shows after 2 minutes, raise the heat a little; if the water starts to boil hard, lower it. The water should stay at a gentle bubble, not a rolling boil.

Look for: Steam fogs the lid; the water bubbles only lightly.

Check by jiggling

Grip a ramekin with tongs and shake it gently. Take the eggs out when the whites are set but the centre still jiggles. Blot any condensation off the tops with a paper towel. Season with pepper and chives and serve straight away with toast.

Safety: These yolks are runny. Use pasteurised eggs if you can. Children, pregnant people, older adults and people with weakened immunity should cook them until both white and yolk are firm, about 3–4 minutes longer.

Look for: The whites are opaque and just set; the yolks are covered by a thin film and the centre wobbles.

Equipment & heat

A deep pan matters: the space above the ramekins fills with steam gradually, so the tops cook at the same pace as the bottoms. On induction, use a pan with a magnetic base and moderate power; keep the lid on to hold in the steam, and turn the power down if the water boils hard: the lid traps heat, it does not calm the water. On gas or electric, adjust until only small bubbles rise. Porcelain egg coddlers with screw lids can stand in the same water bath, but their thick walls and lids slow the cooking by an amount that depends on the model: check them at the same time and keep going in 1-minute steps.

Nonstick: No frying pan needed. The ramekins must sit flat in a saucepan with a lid that closes over them.

Troubleshooting

If the whites are still translucent around the yolk, cover and give them 1 more minute. If the yolks set solid, take them out earlier or use slightly less water next time. Thick-walled ramekins take longer than thin ones.

About this version

Coddling cooks eggs below boiling, in a cup or ramekin standing in hot water, so they set more gently than boiled or baked eggs. This version follows America's Test Kitchen's ramekin method, which needs no special coddler.

Unless stated otherwise, use large chicken eggs, approximately 60 g in the shell, refrigerated. Timings are starting points: use the visual checkpoints and any stated temperature check.

Sources

This guide was written from the references below. Egg Atlas has not kitchen-tested it.

Illustrations by Egg Atlas. They show the method; they are not photographs of a tested result.