Celebrity MasterChef judge Matt Preston reveals your ultimate guide to cooking eggs

Australian celebrity chef Matt Preston has revealed his secrets for cooking the perfect eggs, regardless of whether you prefer them fried, poached, boiled or scrambled.

The former MasterChef judge, 60, told Delicious the best way to make the perfect eggs for a healthy morning breakfast depends on how fresh the eggs are and the cooking style preferred.

Preston revealed exactly how to best prepare your eggs, and why you should never rush the cooking time for the perfect dish.

Poached eggs

Out of the four cooking options, poached is by far the hardest technique to master and often involves adding vinegar to the pot or swirling the water around to create the ‘perfect’ poached egg.

But Preston claims the end result isn’t based on the skills of the home cook, but instead on the freshness of the egg itself.

He said the fresher the egg is, the easier it will be to poach and the better the end result will be.

‘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,’ he said.

Scrambled eggs

In comparison, scrambling egg is possibly the easiest way to serve the morning dish, and if done right the texture tastes creamy and light.

Preston said the secret to ensuring the eggs don’t dry out is to gently cook food and move it away from the hottest part of the pan so you don’t over-cook the eggs.

This process shouldn’t be rushed, and so a medium to low heat would be ideal to use.

Fried eggs

Generally speaking there isn’t a ‘wrong’ way to cook fried eggs, but Preston said there are two approaches to make excellent runny eggs.

The ‘angry’ approach involves cooking the eggs on a high heat in a pan of oil, which may spit and crisp the edges of the whites.

Whereas the ‘calm’ approach gently cooks the eggs with a lid over the pan and creates a thin film on top of the yolk. 

Boiled eggs

When boiling eggs, Preston said the ideal amount of cooking time for either soft or hard boiled eggs depends on a range of factors.

‘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,’ he said.

‘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.’