How to Make Hard Boiled Eggs So They’re Perfect (and Easy to Peel) Every Time

Egg season is upon us! (Think Easter and warm weather picnics where deviled eggs and egg salad sandwiches are served.) As such, you’ll need to know how to make hard boiled eggs that are perfectly cooked and easy to peel. Here’s a simple hard boiled egg hack that yields egg-cellent results every time!

How do I cook hard boiled eggs?

Everybody’s got their own way for making delicious hard boiled eggs, but this recipe for beginners makes it extra easy. Take your eggs out of the fridge 20 minutes before you want to cook them. When they’re at room temperature, place them a pot filled with cold water and then bring the water to a boil. When your water begins to bubble up, turn off the heat and let your eggs sit for 15 minutes in the hot water, keeping them on the heated stove top. Remove them from the pot and then let them sit in a bowl for another two minutes before shocking them in an ice bath or running them under cold water. There you go, straightforward hard boiled eggs!

If you want a different color or texture for your eggs, you can adjust how long you let your eggs sit in your pot of hot water. According to Love & Lemons, eggs left to cook for 10 minutes have a brighter, creamier yolk, while eggs left for 12 minutes or longer have more muted colors and a chalkier texture. It’s all about preference and totally up to you.

How do I keep hard boiled eggs from cracking?

It’s a classic problem: You put your eggs in your pot and as they begin to cook they crack immediately. Luckily, there’s a simple way to keep this from happening. Instead of moving cold eggs straight from the fridge into your pot of water, leave them out on the counter for at least 20 minutes to warm up a bit and get closer to room temperature. You can also put them in a bowl of room temperature water and wait about five minutes. This makes the change in temperature between the fridge and your pot of water less drastic and the shift from cold to hot less sudden, which keeps your eggs from cracking before you even begin to hard boil them.

How do I peel eggs once they’re cooked?

You’ve probably heard that you need to dump your newly cooked eggs in an ice bath to cool them. However, contrary to popular belief, you can actually get the same effect by running them under cold water until they’re no longer warm.

From there, use this quick tip for peeling hard boiled eggs without roughing up your fingers or spilling shell bits all over your kitchen: Put your cooled eggs in a Tupperware container full of water, making sure there’s room for each egg to roll around, and then shake the container vigorously for 30 seconds. Repeat this process, if needed, until all the shell bits have shaken off. Just make sure you’re not shaking your container so hard that the eggs fall apart. You can also try this same trick with a single egg in a glass full of water and get the same effect.

Can I make hard boiled eggs in the oven?

Did you know you can make hard boiled eggs in your oven too? It’s actually a favorite recipe of chef Alton Brown! You’ll just need to preheat your oven to 320 Fahrenheit, place your full eggs in individual muffin tin slots, and bake them for 30 minutes. Take them out, immediately cool them in an ice water bath or cold running water, and peel those bad boys however you see fit. You may notice a few brown spots on your oven-baked eggs, but trust me, they’ll still taste as delicious as ever.

Even if you use just one or two of these quick tricks, you’ll have the best hard boiled eggs ever. Enjoy!