How to Separate Eggs

Several of our recipes call for egg yolk, or egg white, such as Jing’s soft batter recipe, General Tso’s Chicken, and Easy Fried Chicken. When making fried rice, cooking the egg white and yolk separately gives better flavor and texture to the finished dish. To get egg yolk, or egg white, for a recipe, you have to know how to separate eggs. The technique is pretty easy, but you do need a light touch.

Jing and I are both fans of the Three Stooges. I was surprised to learn she had seen their comedy short-films in China. One of our favorites is watching Curly preparing to stuff a turkey. This first step is to separate two eggs:

Now that we know how NOT to do it, would you like to know the easy way to separate eggs?

Separate egg white from egg yolk

1. Start with two clean bowls.
2. If your eggs are farm fresh, be sure to wash them first with mild dish detergent under a warm running faucet.
3. Gently crack the egg at the middle on the edge of the bowl. A light touch is best.
4. Holding the egg over one bowl, pull the shell halves apart slightly, and let the white drop into the bowl.
5. Slowly, gently pour the yolk back and forth between the halves. Keep the halves close together so that the yolk does not drop into the bowl with the whites.
6. The last bits of the egg white will drip over the sides of the shell. Use gravity to your advantage. Slowly turn the shell half containing the yolk upward. The sharp edge of the shell will make the white shear off from the yolk and drip into the bowl.
7. Repeat until you have enough yolk or egg white.

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