The quest for poached egg perfection.

Recently, Ben in Australia (who I did not meet in September because I had not yet made his acquaintance in the blogosphere at the time...) wrote a post about his poached egg conundrum. He's taken a fancy to them, but has not figured out how to achieve a nice consistent result with his cooking method. When I mentioned my egg poacher, he said he would like to see it in action. And so I present "The Quest for Poached Egg Perfection, a Pictorial Demonstration".

Here is the egg poacher. This device was created for the sole purpose of making poached eggs. The cups hold one egg each. The legs hold the eggs out of the water and no precious egg white is lost.

The first step is to lightly oil the egg poacher and place it into a pan with some water.

Notice that the poacher will hold three eggs, which generally compels me to make three poached eggs at a time even though no one person should really consume three eggs at a time. So for the purpose of this demonstration, I restrained myself and left one egg cup vacant.

Next, the lid is place on the pan so that steam will be retained. I generally cook them on medium heat since the food channel shows always cook eggs on medium heat. I'm not sure it makes any difference in this case since water boils at the same temp no matter what the heat is under it...

While the water is coming to a boil, one has time to prepare the toast. Now, don't think me strange, but I have a very specific technique for my poached egg toast. It must be cut into squares before receiving the eggs. I'll explain the reason a bit later in the process.

It is very important to STAY IN THE ROOM where the eggs are poaching. It is very hazardous to leave and PLAY FACEBOOK GAMES while eggs are poaching. It tends to result in the very disappointing overcooked egg. To test for doneness, check the whites with a fork. When the white are fully cooked but the yolk is still runny, they are perfectly cooked.

The extraction of the eggs from the poacher is not explained in the user manual of the egg poacher. I had to learn by trial and error that a knife inserted into one of the slots on the top allows you to suspend the entire device over the toast and then a fork can be used to gently dislodge the eggs. We're almost done.
The whole point of the runny yolk is for it to soak into the toast - ideally, there should be yolk in every bite since it's the best part. This is the reason for precutting the toast. As soon as the eggs are cut, you can mix the whole mess together. Perfection!