The other day I posted a link

The other day I posted a link to an article about Hervé This that mentioned how to unboil an egg.

He explains that when an egg is cooked, the protein molecules unroll themselves, link up and enclose the water molecules. In order to ‘uncook’ the egg, you need to detach the protein molecules from each other. By adding a product like sodium borohydride, the egg becomes liquid within three hours. For those who want to try it at home, vitamin C also does the trick.

Michael Pusateri tried it out (using vitamin C) and it didn’t work so well.

The egg was whole and appeared completely unaffected. The texture of the egg outside felt normal and in no way ‘unboiled’. While I am a professional engineer, I am a amateur scientist. There are several reasons this process might not have unboiled the egg.

Any molecular gastronomists out there want to give this one a shot?

• food
• hervethis
• michaelpusateri