Explaining Eggs

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Published 2011

Eggs are a fundamental part of baking, and understanding them helps you know how to best work with them.

Most recipes (and all recipes that use eggs in this book) call for large eggs. Eggs are sorted by weight, and a large egg weighs 2 ounces (60 g)—the yolk is 1 ounce (30 g) and the white is 1 ounce (30 g).
Brown eggs differ from white eggs because of just one thing—the shell colour. You can use brown or white eggs interchangeably in a recipe, just make sure you use the same size.
Although water accounts for more than 90 percent of an egg’s makeup, egg yolks also contain fat and give tenderness and richness to recipes. The white has protein, giving batters structure and strength so that they hold up and rise.
In a recipe that calls for room-temperature butter, it’s also best to use room-temperature eggs since ingredients of like temperatures incorporate more effectively, producing the ideal texture in the batter and the end result.
Warm eggs whip to a fuller volume than cold eggs. The easiest way to warm eggs is to immerse them, in their shells, in hot tap water. Within 3 minutes, they will have warmed to room temperature, and in 6 minutes they will be warm enough for whipping.

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