I have a method that works every time.  You will not see any nasty green rings around your egg yolks if you boil eggs this way:

Put eggs in a pot and cover the eggs with cold water, by about 2 inches.  Do not put a lid on the pot... yet.

Set your stove burner on medium, put on the pot with eggs, and wait for the water to come to a gentle boil.  By gentle boil, I mean look for blurps, not a full fledged rolling boil like you’d use for pasta or potatoes.  Gentle!

Once you see a steady supply of blurps, remove the pot from the heat.  Now you put on a lid, and let the eggs sit -- covered -- for exactly 14 minutes.  Set a timer so that you get exactly 14 minutes.

After 14 minutes, remove the eggs from the hot water and put them immediately into an ice bath -- a big bowl filled with cold water and lots of ice cubes.

Leave the eggs there for 20 minutes.  

You’re good to go!  Your eggs will be perfectly yellow in the middle (or orange if you’re lucky enough to have very fresh eggs).  There will not be a single speck of green to be seen.

That green stuff, by the way, is ferrous sulfide.  It’s the result of a chemical reaction between sulphur in the egg white, and iron in the yolk, and it’s generally a sign that your eggs are over-cooked.  It won’t hurt you, but now that you know my method, you can aim higher for beautiful hard boiled eggs!

First published by Judy on October 3, 2012

Today's entry is not so much a recipe as it is a tip.  Surprisingly, one of the questions that I receive most often is, "How do you boil eggs?"

No Green Rings Here!