Berin Kinsman

Eggs are on my list of perishable staples, and I always try to keep some hard-cooked eggs in the fridge. If I need a quick snack, I can grab an egg. If I’m running out the door and don’t have time for breakfast or lunch and want to make sure I have some protein, I can grab an egg. I also use them for deviled eggs, egg salad, potato salad and, well, green leafy salads. The key is “fast, easy protein”.

You notice I said hard-cooked eggs, not hard boiled eggs. I don’t boil them; I bake them. The first time Katie saw me do this she was convinced that I’d lost my mind, and that they’d explode into a horribly, smelly mess inside the oven. Rest assured, they won’t.

This is one of the simplest things in the world: place the eggs on the top rack of the oven, with the eggs turned the long way parallel to the bars so they don’t roll. Place a cookie sheet underneath them, in case one does break for some reason (it’s never happened, but I’ve come close to dropping a raw eggs a couple of times; that’s my issue, not the recipe’s). Set the over for 350 degrees, and a timer for 30 minutes.

Get a large bowl and fill it with water and ice, so the water is really, really cold. After 30 minutes, use tongs to remove the eggs from the oven, one by one, and drop them into the ice water. Let them rest for about 10 minutes, then peel them. They will peel easily, because the shells are still colder than the egg inside. You’ll see a couple of brown spots where the egg rested on the rack. That doesn’t affect the taste.

I throw the peeled eggs back into the water so they can continue to cool and the yolks can completely set. I used to leave the shell on and put them back in the egg container, marking an “H” for hard boiled on them with a crayon or pencil. This was a pain, because it defeated the purposed of them being a quick grab snack, and they’re harder to peel when they’ve been allow to sit and chill.

I fold up a paper towel and put it in the bottom of a plastic container, so it can absorb excess moisture, and then put the peeled eggs in. They’ll keep in the fridge for about a week.

When I pack them in a lunch, I put a whole egg or two in a snack-sized ziplock bag with a haphazard dash of salt.

Iron Rations is an irregular column about eating well and eating frugally. You can read more articles in the series here. To subscribe to a Iron Rations-only RSS feed, click here.