This Whisk Trick Makes Removing Hard-Boiled Eggs From Hot Water Much Easier

Cooking hard-boiled eggs is pretty easy. The only problem one may encounter, especially when cooking a large batch of hard-boiled eggs, is getting the cooked eggs into an ice bath to stop the cooking process. Scooping one by one with a spoon can be too slow. No one wants hard-boiled eggs with greenish yolks due to overcooking. Pouring the pot of eggs straight into the ice bath can be daunting and sometimes dangerous. 

Here's a perfect trick to avoid all that, and it involves an unlikely tool everyone has in their kitchen — a whisk. This time, you won't need the whisk for its primary function, as there's no stirring or mixing necessary. You just press the side of the widest part of your whisk onto a hard-boiled egg to pick it up out of the water. Use this trick the next time you're boiling a batch of eggs for pickling or for a deviled egg recipe.

It's pretty simple: When you press the whisk on an egg, it slips right between the wires of the whisk and gets caught inside. You then release the egg into an ice bath by gently pulling the wires apart. The wires return to their original condition after the eggs are released. The wires of most sturdy, large whisks allow the flexibility and movement that makes this possible. 

This method of moving hard-boiled eggs is also a game-changer for dyeing Easter eggs with edible food coloring, and not having stained fingers after the dye job. Instead of using your hands to pick eggs out of the bowl of food dye, you can use your whisk to pick them up and place them on paper towels to dry. Dyed fingers can take several days to fade away completely, and no one wants that. 

Using a whisk to remove eggs from hot water and place them into an ice bath — and take them out of the ice bath — prevents the eggs from falling and cracking, which is common with the use of other tools like slotted spoons.

The best type of whisk for this job is a balloon whisk or any large enough whisk with wires that are flexible enough for an egg to fit through, and strong enough to hold the egg inside. They're typically multipurpose and are the kinds of whisks used for whipping cream and whisking eggs. 

It's important to make sure your eggs do not crack during the cooking process, as this would defeat the purpose of using a whisk to move your uncracked hard-boiled eggs. The best way to prevent cracked eggs is by bringing the water to a boil before carefully dropping your eggs into the water. This also makes the eggs easy to peel when they're done. Adding some vinegar or lemon juice to the boiling water also does a great job of preventing eggs from cracking while cooking.