Recipe Review: Hard-Boiled “Eggs”
Making vegan hard-boiled eggs is ambitious! While there are countless recipes for other seemingly impossible foods such as vegan angel food cake and bac’n, I found only 2 vegan hard-boiled egg recipes with pictures suggesting they were worth an attempt.
Both recipes created an egg-ceptional base for a vegan egg salad! Yet only “Hard-Cooked” Eggless Eggs by The Gentle Chef was successful enough to be showcased when served. In fact, the other recipe was quite disappointing and even frustrating.
I will not link the other recipe to respect the efforts of a fellow food blogger; writing recipes is ambitious too! I will, however, share the details of my journey and warn you that potato flakes make Play-Doh “yolks”.
Play-dohlks I suppose.
Recipe I (intentionally unlinked)
I had high hopes for this recipe! Its ingredients list was particularly accessible to me with only 3 items needed for the “egg” whites and 8 for the yolks. Moreover, all techniques were familiar and no special equipment was needed. yes, please, to fewer dirty dishes!
I also thought using potato flakes for a vegan yolk base was a genius move. I could easily imagine how adding less water than is needed for instant mashed potatoes would create the supple and creamy sphere of a perfectly hard-boiled chicken egg.
But it didn’t.
Recipe I, “Egg” Whites
Eating egg whites, vegan or otherwise, should never be reminiscent of Pop Rocks. Nothing good came to mind when tasting this recipe: soggy Rice Krispies, stale Peeps, almost-flat soda. Since the less-airy center confirmed the ratio of soy milk to agar was en pointe (1 1/2 cups to 2 tsp, or 375 mL to 10 mL), I reasoned the soy milk – not the gelling agent – was to blame.
At various points, I tried stirring-out, popping-away, and even trimming-off these bubbles, but they were too numerous and too deep to eliminate. Thankfully, I had “egg” salad ingredients and another soy milk on hand…
Recipe I, “Egg” Yolks
I previously noted the unfortunate difference between prediction and reality in using potato flakes for “egg” yolks. They even felt like Play-Doh!
There was another discrepancy to settle as well: The amount of potato flakes was listed as “25 g (2 Tbsp)” – but 25 g is more than 1/3 cup (80 mL) of potato flakes! Having a kitchen scale, I opted for the gram measurement which seemed to be correct.
“1 g (1/4 tsp) turmeric” was similarly misleading; my yolks were shockingly yellow and unpleasantly spiced. Already planning to try again, I decided to lean on the words “or less if you prefer” and cut this measurement in half.
Recipe I, Revised (and still intentionally unlinked)
That said, it didn’t completely fail. The end product of Recipe I contained all the flavors I’d expect in a conventional hard-boiled egg; it simply also tasted of turmeric. And, the whites were oddly spongey. Would less turmeric and a different soy milk address these issues?
The short answer is, “no.”
Recipe IR, “Egg” Whites
Pure soy milk created more issues than it solved. Some sponginess was eliminated, but color was added; integrity, lost. I could hardly lift one of these beige-coddled “eggs” without it falling apart!
Yet the most concerning issue was taste. Being only soybeans and water, pure soy milk unapologetically bestowed a sweet beany flavor to my “egg”. I almost tossed this batch.
Recipe IR, “Egg” Yolks
Less turmeric indeed tamed the spiced technicolor original. Yet I became convinced only changing this recipe would transform those Play-Dohlks.
Recipe 2: “Hard-Cooked” Eggless Eggs, The Gentle Chef
Admittedly, I did not want this recipe to work. Its 14-item ingredients list was overwhelming, plus I needed to dirty my food processor and my blender! no, thank you, Skye Michael Conroy.
The resultant mise en place was honestly more off-putting than the imminent processes of emulsification and gelification. I also dreaded needing to freeze the yolk mixture for a goldilocks amount of time until firm; how would I know?
But I knew.
Recipe 2, “Egg” Whites
I can’t confidently explain how adding blended tofu and water to non-dairy milk is different than using more soy milk, but it is. I suspect the coagulants in tofu contributed to the balance of submission and resistance associated with a hard-boiled egg white.
Consequently, dirtying my blender was worthwhile.
Recipe 2, “Egg” Yolks
And so was dirtying my food processor. le sigh. Again, for all its equipment demands, I wanted this recipe to fail! But puréed and slightly thickened tofu mostly worked. (I actually thought it was slightly too thick.)
I also think paprika should be saved for garnishing. Red specks throughout my “egg” yolks screamed, “I’m not a real egg!” too loudly.
Notes for Future Recipe Development
The best vegan egg whites I’ve tried continue to be Wunder Eggs. They look, feel, and taste like the conventional preparation I remember! Conroy’s recipe comes close to this standard, but I still long for a whiter outcome.
I predict changing the non-dairy milk from soy to something brighter like coconut will fulfill this desire. I’ve additionally noted Wunder Eggs contain an almond-cashew-coconut milk blend as well as konjac (presumably for texture, though for whites and/or yolks, I do not know).
And speaking of yolks, The Gentle Chef is my winner. Not even those of Wunder Eggs compare! But paprika has to go, and just to be sure:
no potato flakes!
They really were that bad.
