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We tried a Japanese egg steamer to achieve the perfect breakfast eggs without a stove

Shannon Jan 29, 2022
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No more careful timing needed for the perfectly boiled egg!

Boiling water plus egg equals boiled egg, right? It sounds simple enough, but if you’re aiming for a certain kind of boiled egg, it can take a lot of trial and error to get the right timing. But Japanese electronics maker Koizumi Seiki has taken out the hassle with the Egg Steamer, which – you guessed it – steams eggs (and no, this isn’t a hack like the rice cooker hack).

This recently popular device claims to steam the perfectly boiled egg, whether that’s a rock-hard one or a half-gooey one. And you don’t even need a timer or a stovetop! So of course, we had to put it to the test. Our Japanese-language reporter Natsuki Gojo purchased one for 3,278 yen (US$29) to test it at home.

Koizumi Seiki’s Egg Steamer measures just 23 by 11 by 13.5 centimeters (9 by 4.3 by 5.3 inches), making it perfectly compact for smaller kitchens. Along with the steaming device itself it comes with a lid, a liquid measuring cup, and a cleaning brush.

▼ It’s the little things that matter.

The inside is pretty simple. It consists of a highly conductive stainless steel bottom and a removable egg tray to keep your eggs in place while they cook.

▼ No unevenly cooked whites here!

For this experiment, Natsuki decided to test out three popular types of eggs: a soft-boiled egg, a hard-boiled egg, and an onsen tamago – a slow-cooked egg that resembles a poached egg. She started off by measuring enough water to make two soft-boiled eggs, as indicated by the “mid” label on the liquid measuring cup along with the “1-2” measurement to the right of it.

▼ The more eggs you add, the less water you need.

Next, she added the water to the steamer, set the egg stand in place, and added her two eggs. She closed the lid and set the dial to the appropriate “mid” setting and waited for the magic to happen.

▼ Even the settings on the machine are easy to understand.

She watched as the eggs boiled away, fogging up her camera lens with its reassuring heat. The Egg Steamer beeps when it’s ready, so she waited and listened.

▼ Ding!

When she opened up the two morsels, she found…a perfectly half-gooey center!

▼ And with hardly any effort on her part.

After waiting for it to cool down, she had similarly perfect results with the hard-boiled setting. And by some strange magic, they were super easy to peel.

▼ All she added was water, though! What sorcery is this?

As for the onsen tamago? They were perfectly cooked as well, just like she’d been served at a restaurant. These are particularly difficult to get the hang of cooking without breaking the yolk, so Natsuki was pleasantly surprised.

▼ Can you believe it’s homemade?

While it only takes 10 minutes for the gadget to fully cook soft-boiled eggs and 16 minutes for hard-boiled ones, it takes a 40 minutes to make the onsen tamago, so definitely plan for some extra cooking time if the third type is what you’re planning to have with dinner. Another thing to be aware of is that while you can make six boiled eggs at once, the device only allows you to make three onsen tamago at a time.

▼ The onsen tamago need more space to cook perfectly!

Natsuki also found that you had to be very careful measuring the correct amount of water for the machine. Besides that, another thing that may be a con to some people is that you can’t wash the stainless steel part of the machine – you can just wipe it clean.

Otherwise, she thinks the Egg Steamer is a great investment, especially if you eat eggs on the regular! It will save you a lot of effort when it comes to timing the boil of your egg just right. And while that’s cooking, you can make the rest of your lunch in a bento box-sized rice cooker!

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[ Read in Japanese ]