Welcome to Never Fail, a semi-regular column where we wax poetic about the recipes that never, ever let us down. This week: the soft-boiled eggs that associate web editor Alyse Whitney eats every week.
Even on the craziest mornings when I'm running out the door with one shoe on, I find time to eat a hot breakfast. Sometimes it's a proper one, sitting at a TV table in my living room while watching old episodes of Gilmore Girls, and on more frantic mornings, it's packing some bread in a baggie and some soft-boiled eggs in a Tupperware to eat after my commute.
Wait, soft-boiled eggs on the go? Yeah. It's the most consistent habit I've kept as an adult, and the only meal prep that I make sure to do every-other week. Our jammy egg recipe is perfect: boil water, gently lower eggs in and pray they don't take a Humpty Dumpty fall, set a timer for EXACTLY 6 1/2 minutes, and then get them into ice water to stop cooking. I take things a step further by drying them off and putting them in a bowl in the fridge, unpeeled. That way they don't stink up the subway when I go to work, and they aren't so fragile. When I get to the office, I pour myself a cup of almost-boiling water using the red ("hot") handle of the water cooler, peel the eggs, and let them sit and reheat while I make some toast. The contraband toaster oven at my desk sometimes smokes when I do this, but it's worth the risk. I cut them in half and sprinkle with Maldon salt and pepper, take a picture sometimes, and then smash them down onto buttered toast. Mornings are infinitely better when they start like this.
But soft-boiled eggs aren't just for breakfast! The jammy, just-runny-enough yolk covers a grain bowl just as well as crunchy sourdough toast. I marinate them in equal parts soy sauce and mirin for super-flavorful ramen eggs, or mix them into hot pasta with Parmesan and crispy pancetta for faux Carbonara. Roasted sweet potatoes and broccoli definitely benefits from a runny egg. I love them so much that I even bought these little Le Creuset egg cups and this egg topper so I could feel regal when I make breakfast. I rarely use them, but I like knowing that they're there.
And if for nothing else, soft-boiled eggs are great so you can sing "Space Jam" about breakfast. Everybody get up, it's time to slam now, we got a real jammy egg goin' down. Okay, my lyric-writing may not be perfect, but at least these eggs are.
