When I was about 7 years old, the first meal I tried to cook was scrambled eggs. I’d seen my mom cook them many times. How hard could it be?

I felt fully confident putting a pan on the stove, firing up a burner, putting butter in the pan, giving an egg a good crack – and then, horrifically, watching the egg white and yolk splat next to me feet while I reflexively tossed the broken egg shells in the hot pan. Stove off, clean up the mess before anyone saw me. That cured me of cooking for the next 10 years.

If you’ve had similar experiences, I get it, and that’s what this site is all about: helping you empower yourself with the kitchen skills you need to make easy fully flavorful meals on your own.

As I mentioned at the end of the last post, Freeing Eggs From a Bad Rap, which came on the heels of a piece about how dietary fat does not cause heart disease, this post is about how to make scrambled eggs, which is the most popular way to cook and eat eggs. Before downloading that picture book recipe, which you can do by clicking any picture on this page or this link, here are two easy tips, included in the recipe, to ensure your scrambled eggs turn out fluffy and tender, not fork-bouncing tough and rubbery.

Tip one: adding just a light dash of salt, as shown below, to the eggs before cooking them,…

…adds a little flavor but, more importantly, helps break down some of the proteins in the eggs so that they turn out soft and tender, as shown in the contrasting pictures below.

Tip two: make sure to heat the pan you’re using to the proper cooking temperature. To check the temperature, wet your fingers with tap water, and flick the water onto the hot pan surface. The pan is properly heated when the water sizzles and evaporates on the pan surface – but not so hot that it immediately turns to steam.

Here are the ingredients and…

…pieces of equipment needed to make stove cooked scrambled eggs.

Again, click any picture on this page or this link for easy to follow, step-by-step picture book directions, and have fun making your own scrambled eggs with full-on empowered confidence!