Today when I got home from work I decided I had better use the avocados I have before they go to waste. I've been working on my guacamole recipe for a while and I think I may have perfected it today. I like it pretty spicy but I know most people don't so I try to make it medium hot instead of burn your lips off hot.
Once my tomatoes start coming in I will probably have to revise my recipe so that I can use the fresh tomatoes. As it is now I use two avocados, a 10 ounce can of RO*TEL diced tomatoes and green chilies (drained, seriously drained or it gets too runny), oh about a tablespoon of fresh chopped garlic, a little salt and pepper, ground cayenne pepper and cumin. Mix it all together, put some plastic wrap over it making sure I get out as much air as I can, then pop it into the fridge for a few hours. I use guacamole on most anything, veggie burgers, in a sandwich, scrambled eggs, I toss some in a tortilla with shredded cheese and salsa, and of course nachos one of my favorite deliciously sinful treats.
Anyway, as I was going in and out of the refrigerator I remembered how over the weekend I had had a salad and there were hard boiled eggs in the salad. I really like hard boiled eggs and never seem to make them so I decided I would boil a few up to take in my lunch for work. This got me to thinking, how do you hard boil an egg?!? I know this sounds silly, I've boiled eggs and colored them a million times and when Anne was living here they were a staple in our diet. But for the life of me I could not remember how long to boil them. So of course I googled it and came up with 2,770,000 results.
I found out a lot about how to hard boil an egg and why they turn out or don't turn out in some cases. That dark green color around the yolk is caused from over cooking them. You want to use eggs that are a few days old, using fresh eggs will lead to eggs that are difficult to peel.
Here's the method I used and they turned out just fine:
Put the eggs in a single layer in a saucepan, covered by at least an inch or two of cold water. Starting with cold water and gently bringing the eggs to a boil will help keep them from cracking ( I had one egg crack but it gave me an excuse to eat it for dinner). Adding a tablespoon of vinegar to the water will help keep the egg whites from running out of any eggs that happen to crack while cooking, but some people find that the vinegar affects the taste. I did not add vinegar and the egg that cracked was not a big deal. Adding a half teaspoon of salt is thought to help both with the preventing of cracking and making the eggs easier to peel. I added a splash of salt but as I said I had one egg crack but it was easy to peel. Put the burner on high and bring the eggs to a boil.
As soon as the water starts to boil reduce the heat to low. Let simmer for one minute. (Note I skiped this step because I didn't notice the eggs boiling until they had been boiling for at least a minute! Also, if you are using an electric stove with a coil element, you can just turn off the heat. There is enough residual heat in the coil to keep the eggs simmering for a minute.)
After a minute, remove the pan from the heat, cover, and let sit for 12 minutes. If you are doing a large batch of eggs, after 10 minutes you can check for doneness by sacrificing one egg, removing it with a slotted spoon, running it under cold water, and cutting it open. If it isn't done, cook the other eggs a minute or two longer. The eggs should be done perfectly at 10 minutes, but sometimes, depending on the shape of the pan, the size of the eggs, the number of eggs compared to the amount of water, and how cooked you like them, it can take a few minutes more. When you find the right time that works for you given your pan, the size of eggs you usually buy, the type of stove top you have, stick with it. I boiled 6 eggs, let them sit for 12 minutes and they turned out fine.
Either remove the eggs with a slotted spoon and place them into a bowl of ice water (this is if you have a lot of eggs) OR strain out the water from the pan, fill the pan with cold water, strain again, fill again, until the eggs cool down a bit. Once cooled, strain the water from the eggs. Store the eggs in a covered container (eggs can release odors) in the refrigerator. They should be eaten within 5 days. I drained the water out of the pan, filled it with cold water, repeated this a couple times them dried them and put them into the fridge. Oh yeah and I didn't use a slotted spoon I used my fingers, after rinsing in cold water a few times they were no longer hot.
Once my tomatoes start coming in I will probably have to revise my recipe so that I can use the fresh tomatoes. As it is now I use two avocados, a 10 ounce can of RO*TEL diced tomatoes and green chilies (drained, seriously drained or it gets too runny), oh about a tablespoon of fresh chopped garlic, a little salt and pepper, ground cayenne pepper and cumin. Mix it all together, put some plastic wrap over it making sure I get out as much air as I can, then pop it into the fridge for a few hours. I use guacamole on most anything, veggie burgers, in a sandwich, scrambled eggs, I toss some in a tortilla with shredded cheese and salsa, and of course nachos one of my favorite deliciously sinful treats.
Anyway, as I was going in and out of the refrigerator I remembered how over the weekend I had had a salad and there were hard boiled eggs in the salad. I really like hard boiled eggs and never seem to make them so I decided I would boil a few up to take in my lunch for work. This got me to thinking, how do you hard boil an egg?!? I know this sounds silly, I've boiled eggs and colored them a million times and when Anne was living here they were a staple in our diet. But for the life of me I could not remember how long to boil them. So of course I googled it and came up with 2,770,000 results.
I found out a lot about how to hard boil an egg and why they turn out or don't turn out in some cases. That dark green color around the yolk is caused from over cooking them. You want to use eggs that are a few days old, using fresh eggs will lead to eggs that are difficult to peel.
Here's the method I used and they turned out just fine:
Put the eggs in a single layer in a saucepan, covered by at least an inch or two of cold water. Starting with cold water and gently bringing the eggs to a boil will help keep them from cracking ( I had one egg crack but it gave me an excuse to eat it for dinner). Adding a tablespoon of vinegar to the water will help keep the egg whites from running out of any eggs that happen to crack while cooking, but some people find that the vinegar affects the taste. I did not add vinegar and the egg that cracked was not a big deal. Adding a half teaspoon of salt is thought to help both with the preventing of cracking and making the eggs easier to peel. I added a splash of salt but as I said I had one egg crack but it was easy to peel. Put the burner on high and bring the eggs to a boil.
As soon as the water starts to boil reduce the heat to low. Let simmer for one minute. (Note I skiped this step because I didn't notice the eggs boiling until they had been boiling for at least a minute! Also, if you are using an electric stove with a coil element, you can just turn off the heat. There is enough residual heat in the coil to keep the eggs simmering for a minute.)
After a minute, remove the pan from the heat, cover, and let sit for 12 minutes. If you are doing a large batch of eggs, after 10 minutes you can check for doneness by sacrificing one egg, removing it with a slotted spoon, running it under cold water, and cutting it open. If it isn't done, cook the other eggs a minute or two longer. The eggs should be done perfectly at 10 minutes, but sometimes, depending on the shape of the pan, the size of the eggs, the number of eggs compared to the amount of water, and how cooked you like them, it can take a few minutes more. When you find the right time that works for you given your pan, the size of eggs you usually buy, the type of stove top you have, stick with it. I boiled 6 eggs, let them sit for 12 minutes and they turned out fine.
Either remove the eggs with a slotted spoon and place them into a bowl of ice water (this is if you have a lot of eggs) OR strain out the water from the pan, fill the pan with cold water, strain again, fill again, until the eggs cool down a bit. Once cooled, strain the water from the eggs. Store the eggs in a covered container (eggs can release odors) in the refrigerator. They should be eaten within 5 days. I drained the water out of the pan, filled it with cold water, repeated this a couple times them dried them and put them into the fridge. Oh yeah and I didn't use a slotted spoon I used my fingers, after rinsing in cold water a few times they were no longer hot.
I think it is so funny that I can forget something as easy as boiling an egg. While I was on google I also looked up recipes for using rhubarb, it looks like I'll have a bumper crop this year. I'm not a huge fan of the stuff so I'm always looking for ways of using it in recipes. I found a couple I'm going to try, ones a rhubarb chutney and the other is rhubarb cream cheese cake. I believe I already have the ingredients needed for the cake so if it rains tomorrow like they forecast then I'm going to give it a try. I can always take it to curling with me on Thursday and get my team mates to help me eat it.
OK, so that's my egg story.
OK, so that's my egg story.
