Egg dishes can be eggs-trordinary, egg-xamples of egg-cellence. Some are egg-alitarian and others egg-stravagant… OK, sorry, I needed to get the egg puns out of the way before I started.

This nation loves eggs. Always has. In the past few years, however, Australians have started taking a lot more care and spending a little more money on their eggs of choice. Yet, despite this humble food’s popularity, cooking them well is still an area that can stump even the most accomplished culinary whiz. So, with Easter in the air, here are my secrets to achieving a perfect result with the other Easter eggs.

POACHED

This is the most troublesome cooking method of all, but take comfort in the fact that it’s not (all) your fault and more about the eggs you use. Most recipes that call for them to be dropped into a large pot of boiling water – perhaps with a little vinegar – rely on your eggs being super-fresh, with whites that haven’t yet started to weaken. Yet the eggs most of us buy at the supermarket aren’t at their freshest. 

To know if your eggs are fresh enough to use this method, crack one onto a plate: if the white doesn’t sit proudly and instead creates a puddle around the yolk, this style of poaching won’t work for you, and you need to adapt your cooking method accordingly. 

I use a high-sided frying pan half-filled with simmering water. I gently slip the raw eggs into the water and turn down the heat while jiggling the pan slightly to ensure the white doesn’t stick to the base.

Cook slowly to your liking, without all that swooshing, bubbling and swirling the other method recommends as that will only encourage the white to slip away from the yolk. And be careful not to overcrowd the pan with eggs. They like their space. 

If cooking hacks are more your thing, try poaching older eggs inside an oiled ziplock bag or in high-grade plastic kitchen wrap. To do this, drape the wrap over a mug and drop in the egg, then twist and knot the plastic firmly to seal it in, and slip it into simmering water. It’s possible to poach older eggs in a microwave, but the results can be patchy, so to ensure the egg whites don’t run away, poach your older eggs in oiled silicone cupcake moulds in a shallow pot of water, or buy an egg poacher.

FRIED

There are two schools of thought when it comes to cooking fried eggs: “the angry”  and “the calm”. The angry approach involves dropping the eggs into a pan of very hot oil or fat. As the whites are largely made up of water, the oil will spit furiously and you’ll get toasty flyaways and a bubbly white. I like this method for runny-yolked eggs to throw on a Malaysian breakfast, or in a soft roll with hoisin sauce, crispy shallots and sliced spring onions.

The other approach is calmer and less likely to burn the forearms of the clumsy. Slip your eggs into a lightly oiled non-stick pan (because let’s face it, your non-stick pan has probably seen better days) and cook the eggs gently. Cover them with a saucepan lid if you want the mucus-y film on the top of the yolk to go opaque. This avoids doing the pesky flip to get sunnyside-down eggs which risks breaking the yolk.

For bacon-and-egg rolls, I like to give the eggs one minute in the pan before flipping the two widest parts of the white in to cover the yolk. These veiled eggs make the perfect shape to put in a roll, without any flappy whites drooping out the sides in an unsightly manner. 

SCRAMBLED

You can make creamy scrambled eggs by loading them with butter and cream or you can just cook them slowly, while stirring constantly, for a similarly creamy result. The aim is to cook the beaten eggs gently enough so the proteins don’t set all rubbery (like the bain-marie eggs in most hotels), so keep the eggs moving away from the hottest part of the pan and continue until they’re cooked but not set. Don’t rush this process. 

SOFT & HARD BOILED 

It’s an old foodie joke that the hardest recipe to write is one for the perfect hard-boiled egg. The perfect cooking time depends on everything from the initial temperature of the egg to the size of the egg, and even your altitude and the ambient temperature of your kitchen. 

As a guide, cover your eggs well in cold water and bring to the boil, then cook for three-plus minutes for soft boiled, five-plus minutes for an almost-set yolk, and eight minutes for pale, chalky yolks. 

My preferred method is to bear these standard timings in mind but then use the wobble method to check “doneness”. To do this, take an egg out of the water 30 seconds before it reaches your chosen “done” time and spin it on your counter top. The more the spinning egg wobbles, the softer it will be inside. If it doesn’t wobble at all and stays upright, it’s well done. Try this first with a raw egg so you can see how hard it struggles to stay upright when spinning. I’ve come to learn the perfect slight wobble of an egg that’s soft but not snotty… sorry, runny. 

A slightly more scientific approach is to place room-temperature eggs in a pan of boiling water. Simmer for one minute, then remove from the heat. Leave covered for six minutes for a wobbly soft-boiled egg, and seven minutes for one that’s set white and thick but still with a runny yolk. 

Remember to cool hard-boiled eggs quickly in cold running water to prevent that dark ring forming around the yolk. That’s what my posh nan told me, and she was an egg-spurt… Sorry!