Shell
I am the type of person who cannot feel settled unless I eat an egg at the start of my day.
When I have an appetite, I always eat a hearty breakfast. I make sure to include eggs in my breakfast lineup so that I am conscious of the start of my day.
The cooking process. The texture I prefer. Being able to recreate all of these makes me feel like, 'I'll do my best today.' Perhaps it is my own way of boosting my motivation.
I realized the importance of eggs when I was studying abroad in Germany. At the time (and even now), I was a worrier and poured my heart and soul into eradicating Salmonella.
In Germany, unlike in Japan, eggs are not washed. On the surface of the shell, there are brown things (I won't say what) that were inside the chicken's body, as well as bird feathers. Therefore, I was afraid to eat them raw.
(I apologize if anyone is currently eating, but if you are curious, please look it up.)
Because I made sure to cook them thoroughly, both the white and the yolk would harden and become crumbly. Also, there were times when I cooked them too long and the egg would burn onto the frying pan. Scrambling to scrub it off like I was sharpening my claws, and finally getting the dirt off completely, was an achievement for me.
One day, I tried reducing the cooking time. When I looked it up on the internet, it seemed that most Salmonella bacteria die if heated at a certain temperature for more than a minute.
Thinking, 'It should be fine if I don't heat it that much,' I cracked an egg into the frying pan. I also hate having anything on my hands (I won't say what), so I washed them thoroughly. Then, while watching the inside from outside the transparent lid, I took out the fried egg.
It looked like a soft-boiled fried egg. When I broke it with my chopsticks, the yolk spilled out smoothly. When I poured soy sauce over it, it tasted just as I had wanted. It was a nostalgic taste, a taste I was accustomed to.
Several hours passed, and even at the end of the day, there was no change in my physical condition. I didn't become best friends with the toilet, and I was perfectly fine. In a sense, I thought, 'What a waste of time worrying so much...' and decided that from the next day on, I would cook however I liked.
Several years have passed since that experience. When I cook eggs in Japan, I noticed that the usual excitement is gone.
Failing to crack the shell and having the yolk spill out. Not being able to get it onto the spatula when transferring it to a plate. I used to shout, 'Ahhh!', but recently that has decreased too.
So, I decided to change my cooking method.
Yes, 'boiling'.
When I make boiled eggs, they end up being polarized into either 'hard-boiled' or 'soft-boiled.' This is probably because I haven't grasped the feeling of creating my favorite texture yet.
After repeating the experiment several times, I found that about 7 minutes in boiling water over medium heat is my favorite texture. The first time I ate it, I spilled the yolk and it was a disaster, so now I place a plate underneath.
Also, I like that the feeling of peeling the shell is similar to fortune-telling. After the egg is boiled, I crack the shell all the way around.
I noticed that if I remove the shell and the thin membrane from where it cracked and push it with the side of my finger, it is easier to peel.
(Once, I encountered a tricky egg where this method didn't work. I'll talk about this story if I feel like it, or if there's a request.)
If I peel it well, I'm happy and think something good will happen. If it gets crumbly or the shell separates from the original shape, I predict that something bad might happen that day. I can't start my day without doing this fortune-telling. Before I knew it, I had started thinking this way.
From here, eggs became a part of my life. If eggs disappeared from the supermarket, I would definitely go crazy.
Putting my finger into the eggshell while thinking, 'I hope something good happens.' Enjoying the flavor of the egg that spreads throughout my mouth.
I think this might be the secret to getting through the day happily.