Home Cooking Hacks: Chef and cookbook author Danielle Alvarez's perfect scrambled eggs

In today's Home Cooking Hacks series, we're talking to one of Sydney's top chefs about her ultimate scrambled eggs tricks.

Danielle Alvarez is the acclaimed head chef of Fred's in Paddington and author of the cookbook Always Add Lemon. She has a long history working some of the world's best restaurants and is currently starring in Good Food's Saturday TV show Good Food Kitchen on Channel Nine.

In the series she has made quite the stir showing us some tricks for scrambled eggs, but that wasn't enough for us — we wanted all the details. So, this week Danielle is talking us through scrambled eggs and how to get them just right at home.

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"I think people love scrambled eggs so much because it's so easy. You only need a couple of ingredients and its ready in so little time, literally just minutes," says Danielle of the universally-adored dish.

"I grew up not knowing how to make good ones, so when I tasted these scrambled eggs, it was a revelation. I worked at a restaurant in San Francisco called Boulettes Larder and the chef was a woman named Amaryll Schwertner. She was known for her scrambled eggs. It was a thing of beauty to watch, organic eggs cooked with a knob of butter to form delicate, silky, velvety, cloud like scrambled eggs. Honestly the word 'scrambled' sounds a bit crass compared to the ethereal texture of her eggs.

"One day I found myself cooking the eggs on her section because she was going to be away and being taught by her to make these eggs was one of the great food memories of my life."

Just the way Danielle describes the dish has us drooling and planning how we can get to a kitchen quickly to give it a go — but there are some things we often get wrong at home.

"Probably not using enough butter" is the biggest problem, according to Danielle.

"Restaurant eggs will often have cream or milk added to give it a more custardy texture, but I think if you cook them properly, you shouldn't need to add that," she says. "The other thing is many people will overcook them, they should still look a little bit runny when you take them off the heat as they will continue to cook.

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"Also, get yourself a good, small non-stick pan for eggs only. It's an essential in my home kitchen, the designated egg pan."

Well, we know what we're grabbing at the shops as soon as there's a chance.

In Danielle's technique, she adds her whisked eggs to the pan with the butter, just after the butter has softened and coated the pan a little, but before the butter has melted completely.

This lets the butter melt into the eggs while they're cooking, and she just gently pulls the edges of the eggs into the middle of the pan as she goes, creating soft folds but letting uncooked egg fill the space she's cleared. We have to say, having the butter melt at the same time as the eggs cook is a technique we haven't seen before.

Timing is also super important, according to the expert.

"Scrambled eggs is not something you can drop into the pan and walk away. Once you add the eggs to the pan, you need to watch over them. It may sound laborious, but because they will be done in two minutes or less, you need to pay attention to what's happening in the pan so you can move them around and take them out of the pan at just the right moment," she says.

"Also, buy nice organic eggs and good butter — this makes a big difference."

We don't need more convincing to buy good butter. But now you have permission to do it, for the good of the scrambled eggs, so it's going on the shopping list.

Once we've got the right pan, and the good butter, how else do we stop the eggs going rubbery when we cook them? The trick, according to Danielle, is to only ever cook them over a low to medium heat. Never cook them on high heat, as it sets the egg too quickly, which changes the texture.

But the big question is, what do you serve the eggs with?

"Well, I do love a thick slab of toasted sourdough and some chopped herbs like chives and dill. But to be honest, the non-negotiable for me when the eggs are really good, and they have that perfect texture, is crunchy sea salt and black pepper to finish. I think that's all you really need," Danielle says.

And the chef's parting words of wisdom just make scrambled eggs sound like the perfect dinner tonight.

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"If you have eggs, you have a meal. It's so simple and quick to prepare something nutritious for yourself at home if you eat eggs. They really are a staple my kitchen and have saved me on many occasions when I thought there was nothing else to eat." 

Good Food Kitchen airs on Saturdays at 1pm on Channel Nine and runs until November 27, 2021.