Are you ready to go beyond pressure-cooked hard-boiled eggs? The next breakfast to try in your Instant Pot or multicooker is eggs en cocotte, French for "in pot" or ramekins more specifically. Traditionally, raw eggs are cracked into a buttered ramekin along with a splash of cream and, optionally, your choice of cheese, veggies, and herbs. The ramekins are then placed in a pot filled with a little bit of water. The lid goes on the pot, and the pot goes on the stovetop to boil the water and steam the contents of the ramekins until the egg whites set. It tastes like a cross between poached eggs and an omelette and is heavenly when scooped and spread onto fresh toast. A multicooker makes this process less than five minutes compared to the traditional method, which can take eight minutes to bring the water to boil and another six to seven minutes for the eggs to steam.
You will need an electric multicooker like Instant Pot or Crock-Pot Express, as pictured, as well as a trivet that will fit in the base of the multicooker's bowl and three small ceramic ramekins. We sautéed mushrooms and chives for our pressure-cooked eggs in cocotte, but you can also add in sautéed leek or shallot if you have them on hand. Just keep the overall veggie ingredients about the same so everything fits below the lipped rim of the ramekins.
If you have slightly larger ramekins, try cracking in an additional egg to fill it to just below the rim. A bigger vessel may affect your overall cook time, so be patient as you fiddle with what settings yield eggs the way you like them.
Consider this recipe a loose guideline to introduce the technique. The most important thing to remember is the multicooker will set those egg yolks FAST. So, if you love a runny yolk, start with setting it on a low pressure cook for one minute. Medium eggs, as pictured, will take two minutes.
Ingredients
- 1 tablespoon ghee, plus more for greasing
- 2 cups mushrooms, chopped (or other veggies of your choosing)
- salt
- 1 tablespoon chives, chopped
- 3 eggs
- 3 tablespoons heavy cream
Directions
Using the sauté setting of a multicooker, melt ghee, then sauté mushrooms together, until tender, caramelized, and reduced to 3/4 cup. Season with salt to taste.
Meanwhile, grease the ramekins. When mushrooms are cooked, divide into ramekins. Top each with a teaspoon of chives, a freshly cracked egg, and a tablespoon of cream.
The multicooker pots are nonstick, and so you shouldn’t need to wash them. Simply add 2 cups of water to the bottom of the Instant Pot.
Add the trivet, and place the egg-filled ramekins on top. Secure and lock the lid of the multicooker. Pressure cook on low for 1-2 minutes. Quick release and immediately remove the top when the pressure has normalized. Carefully remove the ramekins. They’ll be hot, so use heatproof oven mitts or mason jar lifters (if you have them).
Serve with freshly toasted bread, like walnut levain as pictured.
(Photos via Brittany Griffin / Brit + Co)
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Anna Monette Roberts
As Brit + Co's Food Editor, Anna Monette Roberts has an insatiable appetite for developing tasty dishes. When she's not dreaming about her next meal, she's . . . well, probably cooking up her creations. Her favorite foods include chewy chocolate chip cookies, Rosé Champagne, and gooey French cheeses — in no particular order.
FAQs
Cover each ramekin with foil. Place the trivet in the inner pot of your electric pressure cooker and pour in 1 1/2 cups water. Arrange three ramekins on top of the trivet and carefully stack the remaining three ramekins on top of the first three. (If you have an additional rack, use it for stacking the ramekins.)
How long does it take to boil an egg in a pressure cooker? ›
Place eggs in a single layer on the trivet. Seal the lid and cook on High Pressure for your desired time: 3 minutes for soft yolks, 5 minutes for medium, or 7 minutes for fully set whites (see below for exact cooking times). Once the cooking time is up, manually release the pressure.
What happens if you put an egg in a pressure cooker? ›
Pressure cooker hard-boiled eggs aren't any quicker to make (the pressure cooker's usual claim to fame), but here's why it's great: it actually makes fresh eggs easy to peel! If you happen to raise chickens or have access to really fresh eggs, a pressure cooker is the best way to make hard-cooked eggs.
How do you keep eggs from cracking in a pressure cooker? ›
Follow this tip: To prevent the eggs from being damaged during cooking, set them in a steamer basket or rack inside the pressure cooker so they're not sitting directly in the water and against the pressure-cooker insert.
What to avoid when using pressure cooker? ›
Pressure Cooker Don'ts:
- Don't open the pressure cooker while cooking. ...
- Don't release the pressure before it's time. ...
- Don't overfill the pressure cooker. ...
- Don't add thickeners. ...
- Don't give up after one bad experience.
You determine your doneness by the amount of water you add to the tray. The egg cooker comes with a small measuring cup with fill lines on it. On one side are lines for soft-boiled, medium-boiled, and hard-boiled eggs, and on the other side is a line for poached eggs and omelets — more on that later.
How much water do you put in an egg in an egg cooker? ›
How to Use Egg boiler
| No of Eggs | Hard (water Quantity) | Soft (Water Quantity) |
|---|
| 1 | 66ml | 33ml |
| 2 | 64ml | 30ml |
| 3 | 60ml | 27ml |
| 4 | 56ml | 24ml |
2 more rowsYou can place a couple eggs in the pot (no trivet or anything) while cooking rice and they'll come out nicely hardboiled. I recently started doing this and it works great.
Can I put raw egg in a pressure cooker? ›
The answer is they'll turn out great! Pressure cookers cook foods with steam and pressure, and both are very good for hard-boiling eggs since the whites will come out tender and not rubbery, and the shells will come off more easily than cooking them in any other way.
How do you know if an egg is bad? ›
Simply fill a bowl with cold tap water and place your eggs in it. If they sink to the bottom and lay flat on one side, they are fresh and good to eat. A bad egg will float because of the large air cell that forms at its base. Any floating eggs should be thrown out.
Eggs are prone to cracking because the force from the boiling action causes them to clash into each other. This leads to the shell splitting open and the whites spilling out of it. What you'll end up with is a boiled egg that's safe to eat, but will have a mushy texture.
At what pressure does an egg crack? ›
Usually, it takes a little more than 5 ½ pounds of force to crack an eggshell — much less than the weight of a human being — but the precise amount of force needed depends on the direction in which that force is applied and how much the force is distributed (or not) over the surface of the shell.
Why does vinegar stop eggs cracking? ›
Here's why: The vinegar's acid not only dissolves some of the calcium carbonate in the shell, it also helps the whites set faster. Running the hard-boiled eggs under cold running water as you're peeling, meanwhile, helps the shell separate from the membrane.
Can you put a ramekin in the crockpot? ›
You can fit four or five 3-inch (6-ounce) ramekins into a 6-quart oval slow cooker without having them touch each other. You use ramekins for baking muffins, cupcakes, and individual custards.
Can you put anything in a pressure cooker? ›
Just about any ingredient that can be steamed, or is cooked with liquids, can be cooked in a pressure cooker.
Can I use ramekins for steaming? ›
Cover with foil and place the ramekin into the boiling water. Cover and steam for 12 minutes. Uncover, carefully remove the ramekin, and take off the foil. Top with chives if you like.
Can I put glass container in pressure cooker? ›
Assuming that you are talking about a tempered glass bowl that is marketed as microwave, dishwasher and oven safe, there should be no problem in the pressure cooker. For glass vessels, the most critical uses are rapid temperature changes and uneven heating, the surrounding pressure isn't an issue.
