1 hour ago, btbyrd said:It's strange that your whites were still on the "egg soup" end of the spectrum -- especially if they were medium eggs. They shouldn't be soupy, though I wouldn't describe them as firm. They should definitely be opaque and non-fluidlike -- at least for the firm white. Anyway, the real draw of SV egg-cookery is precision with yolk texture. The egg whites are always a little gross. Dave Arnold's egg chart video is a good indicator of what you can expect at various temps for the yolk and white.
As far as soft boiled eggs are concerned.... I mean, SVing a soft-boiled egg isn't always a total waste of time. It depends on how much time you've got and how much you care about producing a particular result. It's just that to get a proper soft-boiled texture on the whites, you have to do 2-stage cook, and that's very fussy for most cooks and applications. But if you were doing a tasting menu in a fine dining context, it could make sense. I mean... I've done the "boil it first, then SV it" trick on a couple of occasions when making ramen. But nowadays I just do it on the stovetop like an ordinary chump... because I know I can get good-enough results in very little time.
Yup, it is very strange. The whites were much less done than those pictured. They were closest to Dave's 62Cs. In retrospect, I should have done two cold eggs and two at room temp, to gauge the difference.
Thanks for the additional information.
