How to Crack an Egg - Revisited

In response to a post I made awhile back, about how to crack an egg. I have received some comments about how it does not work as I explained. How egg shell still manages to get into the bowl. Thinking about this has made me consider some points. The first being, "did I describe the procedure differently than I actually perform it?", the next being "Or maybe I'm just superbly gifted at cracking eggs!".

Well I analyzed what I had written and compared it with what I do. The two I believe are still compatible, so my problem became, how to I articulate my words to better describe the act of cracking an egg. I've tried words, heck I've tried pictures, which as we all know is worth a thousand words AND is a fact. This led me to the next logical format, video. So, "Behold, my creations!"

 

First, let me apologize for the stuttering sound in the videos, that is the auto focus doing its bit to be annoying. During the making of the videos, I went through several takes. The problem was not with the actual cracking of the eggs, but rather with holding a video camera AND cracking an egg with both hands, all without the aid of a tripod... I spent way too much time focusing on the camera and not what I was doing in the first two videos and the performance looked terribly amateur, especially since I forgot to turn it off and recorded some extra footage in the first one. The third video was a progression away from that and more towards actually paying attention to what I was doing. The last video (also the only video I'm willing to admit exists, the others are fakes, honestly...) I paid attention entirely to the egg. The theme across all of the videos though, is that of the seven eggs I cracked, not one left any shells in the bowl.

Clean smelly rags and sponges

A sponge or rag that has gotten smelly is something no one ever wants to use and from a sanitary standpoint it is very frowned upon. Running it through the wash helps, but it takes a long time. So what do you do with one of your kitchens essential tools?

First we need to understand why it is smelly. From all of the cleaning you do, you're picking up microbes, bacteria and another forms of microscopic life. A sponge or rag is put away damp at best, which is an ideal habitat for these lifeforms to grow and reproduce. As a byproduct of living they produce funky smells among other things.

Now that we know what causes the smells, we can take steps to prevent this. The easiest way is to not let it sit in water and always wring it out when you are done. We can also use a sanitizing solution instead of water when cleaning up, this will both sanitize what your cleaning AND the sponge itself. This will save time and effort in the long run. However, you may need to sanitize the unsanitary and offensive smelling rag, this is where my efforts will be directed.

Take your smelly rag or sponge, in this case I have my most prized sponge, and dampen it. You don't want it too dry or you may damage the sponge, but you don't want it too wet either. Just soak it and then ring it out, this will be the right level of dampness.

Place the sponge in the microwave. The idea behind this is you will kill the micro organisms with steam generated inside the sponge itself. The microwaves them selves will kill their fair portion as well.









Set the microwave for 30 seconds. You don't want to over microwave it, but you also don't want to under nuke it.

Careful, the rag will be hot and steam should be coming out of it and the microwave. Handle with care!

Cool and rinse with cold water. When you ring it out, the water won't be clear, this is dirt, oil and dead micro organisms. Smell the sponge or rag, if it still smells, repeat the process once or twice more until it has no smell.








This is more effective and faster than running it through the wash. It only takes a few minutes and you will have a sanitized sponge to use right away as opposed to an hour in a washing machine. Besides why would you want to through a smelly rag in with your clothes? That's disgusting!

I am going to add the lean tag here because I covered some key points, the first was, by changing the process of cleaning up (by not letting it sit in water) we ended up with a much better result with only a little added effort. The second key point is cutting out the clothes washer as a cleaning step. It takes a long time and isn't nearly as effective as the microwave. Though ideally, you should never have to use the microwave step, if you always ring out the sponge and set it out to dry.

How to crack an egg

If you're like me, then you probably thought you knew how to crack an egg. If you are like me, you probably learned to crack the egg on the side of the bowl or frying pan, or any edge that is nearby. I've seen my mom crack eggs since I was a kid, it's easy, right? The answer is yes, your just making it harder on your self.

The reason this is the wrong way to crack an egg is that you end up needing to crack the eggs into a small bowl before you add the egg to the recipe. This is all right until you realize that the reason you crack it into the small bowl in the first place is so that you can remove any egg shell pieces that may have accidentally fallen in along with the egg itself. This means the sole problem with cracking an egg on the edge of something is that it can inject tiny egg shell fragments into the your eggs.

Another problem, is that taking the egg out of the shell and into a bowl so that you can remove the shell fragments, only to transfer it again to another bowl is a waste of time and resources. Your creating dirty dishes, wasting time, and not adding any value to what your cooking. In the Lean Manufacturing System (something that is going to come up again in future posts), these are big no-nos.

The easier way to crack an egg is to crack it against a flat surface, along the widest point of the egg. You don't need to hit it hard, in the past I have let gravity do the work for me by dropping it from less than 3 cm above the surface (I mention only to emphasis how little effort you actually need). This will cause the egg to crack cleanly around its circumference and allow you to open the egg effortlessly and without any shell fragments from entering the egg.

Don't, crack on the edge of something

Do, crack on a flat surface

Now, I know I said that using that extra step of putting the egg into a bowl was a waste of time. Well, I lied, kind of. Depending on what you are doing with the egg, it can be an unnecessary extra step or it can save your dish. I would only recommend using the bowl in one circumstance. That being, if you are unsure of the quality of the eggs you are using. If you're in doubt and think they are either low grade or nearing there expiration dates, you can crack them into the bowl and inspect them before adding to your recipe.