Five Tips for Perfect Boiled Eggs

Bowl of salad with two boiled egg halves on top

It seems simple. Eggs, water, heat.
But there are lots of possible pitfalls when boiling eggs. Boil them too long and you’ll get rubbery whites and chalky or green yolks; too short and you’ll get inedible eggs. And peeling the eggs is a whole other battle. Don’t worry, we’ve got the steps to make it easy to cook your eggs perfectly and we’ll tell you how to make them easier to peel, too.

Use the right amount of water.

You can comfortably cook three eggs in about 1.5 quarts of water. If you’re cooking more eggs, you’ll need to increase the pot size and the amount of water. Need a lot of eggs? Cook them in batches. Six eggs are the most we recommend cooking in a single batch. Adding in too many eggs will alter the cooking time and could lead to inconsistent results.

Start the eggs in boiling water.

Want easier to peel eggs? Adding them to already boiling water can help. The whites will stick to the shell less and improve your chances when peeling them.

Top-down view of three boiled egg halves, showing how the eggs look at 4 minutes, 6 minutes and 11 minutes of cooking time

Cook for the right amount of time.

Soft boiled eggs should be simmered at a low boil for 4 minutes for just-set whites and liquid yolks. For a jammy egg, boil for 6 minutes. Hard cooked eggs take the longest. Cook them for about 11 minutes.

Shock the eggs to stop the cooking.

Have a bowl of ice water ready. When the time is up, put your eggs into the ice water. Leave the eggs in the ice water for two minutes before peeling.

Peeling success? Lots of little cracks.

Start the peeling process by gently pressing the egg against a hard surface and cracking all over. Peel the shell under cold, running water also helps make easier removal of the shells.