Has anyone tried Lakeland’s silicone poachpods? Best sellers, apparently. They’re like small rubber cloches that you bung, upside down, into boiling water, and into which you crack an egg. Hey presto, after a few minutes, you get perfectly poached eggs which slide out with a deft shake to perch proudly, circumferences immaculately intact (no pinked edges), on equally perfectly grilled toast – allegedly. The theory is that you can leave your eggs to their own devices safe in their little, smooth silicone nests as they dance around in the eddy of boiling water while you tend to your toast.
However, the result, in my case, was unedifying and only just edible. Ten minutes chasing each other around in their cute little vessels, the whites were still slopping about. Perhaps more water was needed but, in topping up, the jet from the kettle spout caught one of the brightly coloured coracles as it careered across the pan. This solved nothing as the pods and their contents merely flailed about at a higher level while one, of course, had acquired a small matter of extra liquid. I gingerly tipped it to one side to allow the surplus to escape – a combination of water and egg white. Oh well! With half the white gone, that egg should cook quicker. I didn’t time it but my legs were starting to buckle with the wait (note: NOT weight!) and the toast must have been on its third toasting in the Russell Hobbs.
However, the overall result was a complete dis-arster! After running a knife round between egg and pod, and much shaking, the yolks finally yielded and plopped (or was that more of a bounce? It was a bit of both really for the bottom part of the yolk was solid while the top was gently runny) onto gum shredding toast with the whites, scraped free afterwards, arranged like torn lace on top. (The pods are now soaking in the sink.)
Where eggs-actly did I go wrong? Anyone cracked it?
