The Unexpected Tool Martha Stewart Uses To Easily Separate Eggs

Now that egg prices are finally down, there are so many recipes we can try at home. Some egg dishes require separating egg yolks from the whites, which often leads to a mess. Using the eggshell is the most common way to do this, though it doesn't guarantee success all the time. Worse, it can lead to a broken yolk or unwanted bits of the shell in the dish. Also, when separating multiple eggs for a recipe like meringue or custard, the pressure to get it done quickly can easily ruin one's focus and cause a sticky kitchen disaster. If you're tired of dealing with this deceptively simple task, don't worry, Martha Stewart has a clever and no-mess hack for this problem.

Among the many utensils found in the kitchen, the celebrity chef trusts the spider strainer the most to separate yolks from the whites hassle-free. The tool, with its signature round, wire mesh, is generally used for deep frying and blanching, but Stewart swears by it for neatly isolating the egg yolks from the albumen. She balances the strainer over a bowl and cracks the egg over its wire basket. She'll then let gravity do the work of separating the two, as the egg white is bound to slip through the mesh, leaving the egg yolk intact in the basket. All that's left to do is to slide the yolk off the basket and into a separate bowl.

While Martha Stewart's spider strainer trick is a game-changer for separating eggs, that's not the only use she's found for the tool when cooking with eggs. According to Snoop Dogg's BFF (and cooking show collaborator), the kitchen utensil works just as well for handling boiled eggs — especially when you need to prepare several eggs all at once. (Don't worry, there's plenty you can do with leftover hard boiled eggs.) Fishing eggs out of boiling water with tools like a spoon can be challenging since their shell tends to be slippery in water. If you resort to covering the pot with the lid and pouring out the water over the sink, the eggs can roll and bounce, and sometimes their shells crack when you're not careful enough.

Stewart likes to use a spider strainer to handle freshly boiled eggs because its wide, shallow basket makes it easy to scoop up multiple eggs in one sweep. It can catch the eggs effortlessly and prevent them from crashing into each other or dropping into your sink. The television personality also notes that it's the perfect tool when cooking boiled eggs which require precise timing to ensure that perfect "jammy" yolk. With the spider strainer, you can scoop the eggs quickly and cool them down fast with an ice bath to achieve the consistency you're going for.