Rachael Ray's Tip To Easily Remove Broken Eggshells From A Dish
If you've ever accidentally gotten a shard of broken eggshell in your mixing bowl, then you know how exceedingly frustrating it can be trying to fish it out with your finger. Luckily, Rachael Ray's got the perfect tip to easily remove those pesky fragments: Just use another piece of eggshell.
In an episode of the "Rachael Ray Show" posted to YouTube, the celebrity chef and author demonstrated how she uses a just-cracked eggshell to scoop out any random shell bits that could potentially ruin your meal or baked good. She posited that the reason this trick works is because the shells almost seem attracted to each other. While plenty of internet foodies have come to similar conclusions, claiming that this occurs because the pieces of shell share a membrane, there doesn't appear to be much scientific evidence to support the theory. Instead, it may be because, as food science writer Harold McGee told Food52, when you try to remove the shell by hand, your fingers become coated in egg white, which repels the fragments; using an eggshell as a scoop doesn't cause the same reaction, making retrieval easier.
Ray is by no means the first person to recommend this nifty method for keeping your cooking shell-free. The tip she shared has been endorsed by other celebrity chefs including Jamie Oliver and food writer Alison Roman.
Avoid broken shells in the first place
Of course, wouldn't it be better to avoid broken eggshells altogether? Cracking eggs on a flat surface rather than on the rim of a bowl or the edge of a countertop is a technique often recommended by chefs and other culinary experts. To start, it reduces the likelihood of the eggshell shattering into small pieces, which then fall right into the bowl. When eggs are cracked on a sharp edge, the applied force can actually push tiny pieces of eggshell into the egg, making them difficult to spot and remove. Chef and humanitarian José Andrés also points out that if the exterior of the egg is contaminated, bacteria can spread to the inside of the egg when cracked improperly. To that point, another handy secret when making eggs is to crack them into a smaller dish first. That way, you have the opportunity to remove any errant shell pieces before using them in any recipes.
Cracking eggs on a flat surface can also help to create a cleaner break, resulting in fewer jagged edges. This is because the inner membrane is less prone to breaking from this cracking method, meaning any broken pieces stick to it instead of falling into your mixing bowl or pan. It also makes it easier to cleanly separate the two halves of the shell without breaking the yolk. However, you might want to get this method down pat before you start dabbling with the one-handed crack.