Gordon Ramsay: You either love him or hate him. There are only fans or haters. No one in between. But Ramsay’s tips for ‘perfect’ breakfast eggs have drawn uniformly negative feedback. “Like watching Bob Ross paint!”
Professionally staged, with knobs of butter and some superfluous
scallions, Ramsay shows off his idea of ‘perfect’ fried eggs…
There’s one major difference between the late, great Bob Ross and Ramsay. Ross never claimed to be a DaVinci. But Ramsay has worked long and hard to craft his image as a food virtuoso. So it must be especially galling for him when his fans to push back against his pronouncements.
About the eggs…
All that aside, this post is about his recent video on how to prepare ‘perfect’ breakfast eggs. Ramsay has deigned to grace the online community with his official take on frying and scrambling eggs. And folks have not held back in their criticisms.
Fried Eggs
To be precise, we’re talking sunny side up.
Note: if you’ve abandoned sunny side eggs because of official warnings that runny yolks are going to give you food poisoning, take a deep breath and a step back. According to studies archived by the US National Library of Medicine, just 1 in every 20,000 or so eggs MAY be contaminated. Aside from the negative criticisms of Ramsay’s method, it does offer a way to cook the yolks to a high enough temperature to kill Salmonella bacteria. It’s all about the butter!
Ramsay says to start by charging the pan with a little olive oil, for flavour. Then crack the eggs into the pan as usual, adding a pinch of salt and pepper. And allow them to sit until the whites are set. That, says Ramsay, is the time to toss in several knobs of butter, which froths and cooks the tops of the eggs.
Salmonella is neutralized at 165 F. Butter froths at 212 F.
“Damn, there’s so much oil on the eggs that the US is looking to invade,” one TikTok user commented.
Another added, “I will never agree with how Gordon cooks his eggs.”
Scrambled Eggs
Ramsay says don’t over-stir your scrambled eggs – and stir gently. Don’t cook them until they’re dead-dry. He adds a little Crème Fraîche to help avoid over-cooking, and removes the pan from the heat before the eggs are totally done. Thanks to residual heat in the pan, they’ll carry on cooking until ‘properly finished’.
“All I see is a whole lot of ‘not done yet’,” a fan commented.
“How not to make scrambled eggs,” another joked.
My take
I agree with the comments that there’s an awful lot of ‘grease’ on the fried eggs. But both Olive Oil and Butter add flavour and classic mouth feel to a lovely fried egg. And Ramsay isn’t saying you have to eat all the fat. I’d drain my Ramsay-style sunny-sides on a paper towel before serving.
As for the scrambled eggs… I love his take. There’s nothing more disappointing than a plate of crumbly scrambled egg chunks swimming in a watery ‘whey’ bath. The Crème is admittedly a little over the top for everyday cooking. But you could just as easily toss in a spoonful of sour cream or yogurt instead, if you have some on hand.
The ‘runny yolk’ controversy also extends to home-made mayonnaise, Eggs Benedict and other classic dishes. But we’ll look at them another day…
~ Maggie J.