The best way to fry an egg is the way you like it. There are countless styles and subtleties in frying an egg. This is a way to make a great fried egg that is very popular around the world.
The breakfasts on a trip to Basque country in Southwest France and Northwest Spain briefly got my senses heightened to how different something as simple as a fried egg can turn out, depending on just a couple of details. How different their fried egg was from my usual. It got me thinking, if they’re so great, why don’t I make them this way more often?
Right or wrong, I tend to call these European Fried Eggs. Italian Fried Eggs, Spanish Fried Eggs, Basque Fried Eggs and beyond… I’m not an authority on all the countries that like their eggs fried this way, but it’s how my husband’s Italian mother made them, and generally how my experience has been with fried eggs in Europe and among Europeans, wherever they live.
I grew up with fried eggs being flipped and flat, low and slow. Gently cooked on both sides. They’re very good I must say, and I still make them that way, half the time. Flipped and flat fried eggs have their advantages. However, if you haven’t tried sunny-side-up, hot-basted fried eggs, you could be missing out. They make for an especially great fried egg.
Overview of Making a Great Sunny-Side-Up Fried Egg
Here’s a quick overview of making a great sunny-side-up fried egg:
- Cooked entirely sunny-side-up with no flipping.
- Oil added to a hot pan, then eggs added to hot oil.
- Eggs basted with the hot oil.
Generally, basting the eggs with the hot oil turns out higher, puffier, and bubbly egg whites with crispy or lacy edges. For non-crispy, just adjust the heat down.
The yolk, although commonly barely cooked, can turn out however you want it to: over easy, medium, hard—depending on how much you baste it.
Making a Great Fried Egg
Making a great fried egg isn’t difficult. The quality of the eggs, the skillet, heat and timing all contribute to a great fried egg.
Fresh Eggs are Best
Seeking out fresh eggs is well worth it. The quality of the egg = the quality of the fried egg. It makes a big difference. We want fresh eggs with a firm round yolk that stands high, and a thick cloudy white albumen that stays compact in the pan. The older the egg, the less firm the structure is. The yolk flattens and widens. The white clears, thins and spreads out in the skillet.
I hear ya. Getting quality fresh eggs isn’t always easy. Knowing someone with chickens who you can buy your eggs from is a luxury in life. Through the years, we’ve bought super fresh eggs from thatched-roof streetside produce vendors, neighbors, and even colleagues with land for hens to wander around.
Buying eggs at the supermarket can be confusing with all the designations. In the U.S. we look for pasture-raised (2nd choice: free-range), certified-humane, organic fed, no-antibiotics, non-gmo. Whew!
Since the egg’s air pockets get bigger with age due to moisture loss through the shell pores, simple air pocket tests can be done to test freshness. Like holding them up to bright light, or putting them in water to see if they stand up (old) or stay down (fresh). As helpful as this is, at our house, once we have them, we don’t usually bother. However, since every egg in a dozen often seems to be of a different age, when you want to use the firmest egg white possible for, say, poaching or whipping, a quick little test can come in handy.
Interesting Tidbits about Eggs
- Yolk in ye olde English? geoloca, from geolu, aka: yellow. (Even if yolk color is influenced by what chickens eat, and can go from deep orange through a range of colors.)
- The egg white, or albumen, comes from albus, Latin for… white.
- It takes two. (But not always.) If a hen mates with a rooster, the hen will lay fertilized eggs. If the hen hasn’t mated, the hen will lay unfertilized eggs. Either way, she’ll keep layin’ eggs!
Choosing Your Skillet
The smaller the skillet, the better—as small as you can get to accommodate all the eggs. A small skillet works best so that you can use less oil to be able to easily spoon it up when gently tilting the pan.
Other than that, it’s your choice. Cast iron, enameled cast iron, carbon steel, stainless steel, ceramic, they will all work with enough hot oil, butter or grease.
TIP: Getting any pan hot first, and then getting the oil hot before the egg goes in the skillet, helps keep eggs from sticking.
- While stainless steel pans generally tends to stick more, adding some butter to the olive oil solves that, making it virtually nonstick.
- A nonstick pan is convenient. Just keep in mind due to health concerns with nonstick pan coatings, the advice is to not cook with them above medium heat. You also have to be more careful not to damage the nonstick coating while basting with a metal spoon.
THE SPOON: A long handled iced tea spoon works well here.
Finding the Right Level of Heat
- We want it hot, but not smokin’ hot. Too high, and the oil will become unruly and unmannerly, sputtering and spattering.
- If you don’t like crispy, lacey edges, lower the temperature.
Take Care: Careful not to let the heat get so high it spatters out and burns your arm. Don’t add small amounts of water to (or even have wet hands with) this much hot oil or grease while cooking — that could burn more than an arm.
How Long to Cook the Egg?
We get a feel for how long to fry an egg with experience. How long yours takes depends on how high you have the heat, and how you like it:
Types of Fried Eggs
How do you like your egg?
Sunny, runny yolk? Over easy? Over medium? Cooked all the way to fully set? Any fried egg style can be cooked without flipping the egg. The more you baste with oil, the more it cooks on top. You can baste each egg in the pan differently according to each eater’s preference for doneness, and have them all ready at the same time.
- SUNNY EGG: If you want the yolk to remain liquid, just baste the white and not the yolk.
- OVER EASY EGG: Besides basting the white, baste the yolk with the hot oil just until it turns opaque white.
- OVER MEDIUM EGG: After the yolk turns opaque white, keep basting about another minute.
- OVER HARD EGG (OVER WELL): Once the yolk has turned opaque white, keep basting the yolk with the hot oil a few more minutes, or until fully set.
How to Keep Fried Eggs Separated in the Skillet
To keep the fried eggs separated in the skillet, add the eggs at least 10 seconds apart.
Or you can use culinary egg rings, onion rings or bell pepper rings to keep the eggs separated. Any other ideas?
Enjoying a Great Fried Egg
Mastering the art of a great fried egg is a rewarding pursuit. Fried eggs are great served in a myriad of ways: dressed up, dressed down, for breakfast, lunch or dinner.
Here are some of our favorite ways at our house to enjoy a great fried egg:
- A great fried egg with mesclun salad and avocado
- A great fried egg with a quick springtime sauté of fresh fava beans and peas with thinly sliced shallots, sprinkled with ripped mint leaves
- A great fried egg with a quick sauté of asparagus
- A great fried egg with cured sausage (salsiccia secca, saucisson, salchichon) that has been thinly sliced and thrown on the skillet during the last minute (literally) of cooking the egg. Traditional in the Mediterranean, my Sardinian father-in-law ate this almost every day of his life with just two or three slices of salsiccia secca and paper-thin Sardinian bread — pane carasau. This is a very occasional meal for us, sometimes once a year (ok, sometimes more), and always deeply satisfying. Great served with some rustic bread and glass of red wine.
Recipe for a Great Fried Egg
Ingredients
- olive oil, butter or cooking grease
- 1 egg
- salt & pepper
Instructions
- Heat a small skillet on medium heat for half a minute.
- Add just enough olive oil to be able to scoop up a spoonful when slightly tilting the pan. Let the oil heat up over medium heat until hot.
- Crack the egg into the pan, sprinkle with salt, and adjust the heat down.
- Carefully tilt the skillet to pool the hot oil, and spoon it over the egg. Adjust the heat down further if it starts to sputter and spatter. You can puncture any huge bubbles in the egg whites with your spatula.
- Continue to baste the eggs with the hot oil until cooked how you like them. – If you want a sunny yolk (runny), baste mostly over the egg white. To set the yolk firmer, give the yolk more attention, basting it with more spoonfuls of oil:– For over easy, baste the yolk just until it turns opaque white. – For over medium, baste about a minute more. – For a hard yolk, or over well, baste a few minutes beyond it turning white.
- Mill a little pepper on top and Enjoy.
