Frying with Titanium, cracking the code

Last weekend I cut the last 1.5 convolutions off an ordinary cardboard egg carton, put two farm eggs in it straight from the fridge on Friday afternoon, into a Yeti lunchbox with some Kerrygold, then into my bear canister early Friday evening. Had egg and bread on Saturday morning, then trucha con huevo on Saturday night. The eggs were fine.

At some point I might buy the Evernew egg container — smaller than my Coghlan’s six pack.

eggs are pretty tolerant of being out of the fridg

until you crack the shell

eggs are pretty tolerant of being out of the fridg

until you crack the shell

Probably a lot more true if you can find locally produced eggs that haven’t been washed, as they will keep at room temperature a lot longer.

https://www.cfsph.iastate.edu/thelivestockproject/eggs-is-washing-and-refrigerating-necessary/

All true about the eggs.

Here in the US eggs are washed (mostly to get rid of barnyard/cloaca goo and the odd Salmonella) so the “natural water-and-germ-proofing” is gone, and we all refrigerate them.  When backpacking sometimes I don’t worry about eggs being out of the fridge for the first day or two; they’ll be fine.  If I want to have fresh eggs longer, or if I don’t care about the extra ounces, I’ll bring the cooler/blue ice described above.

But I always use the plastic egg protector with fresh eggs because it works much better in a pack than a hacked-off portion of a store carton.  Have learned this from experience.  The Coughlan carrier doesn’t crush (egg cartons do; I know), and it has little plastic fingers to hold the pointy end of the egg that provide a little bit of shock absorption.

Getting farm-fresh, unwashed eggs from some farmer is mostly a nonstarter for me, living in the middle of a city of 2.6+ million.  I suppose I could look around for co-ops or the like, but I’ve never bothered.  When hiking in other countries if desired I most definitely just get eggs from some local unrefrigerated source.  But I do wash them with soapy water just before use and crack carefully.

Back OT:  I used to scramble eggs when backpack cooking, but as mentioned several times up-thread, mixing the yolk with the whites does make things more sticky.  These days I typically fry something =carefully=  over my cheap, generic ISOButane stove in my thin, cheaply-adonized aluminum frypan, often using Ghee (Canadian Bacon is perfect for this; as can be that shelf-stable bacon, or maybe but likely not rehydrated freeze-dried hash browns), using lotsa swirling of the pan.  Crack the eggs over the now done stuff, cover pan with lid/Alu foil, and low/slow-cook for 3-4 minutes adding a bit of water to steam the top of the egg yolk.  Perfection!  And little sticking/easy clean-up.

Off-topic regarding frying, but a tip for easy egg carry is to hard boil them at home. They last longer and never leak. Some grocery stores even sell them hard boiled.

I knew that parchment paper would work to create a sacrificial non-stick layer for frying. In reading up about frying delicate food like fish, I came across an article that stated that it even works well with Teflon coated pans. The reason is that oil tends to bead up on Teflon surfaces preventing even searing. Parchment paper will help to keep an even coating of oil allowing for a better sear (Some people even use a paper towel). Here are pictures where I fry salmon on parchment paper. This technique will work great even on unseasoned pans. My 2 cents.

You don’t need the oil – you can do this with just the parchment too.

Very very clever!
Cheers

Correct, oil is not required, however; oil can give you a better sear of the skin (crispy).  I believe that oil also helps to spread the heat and that is particularly important with the thin walled titanium fry pans.  Here is an alternative sacrificial edible layer: Rice Wrappers.  My 2 cents.

Wet the Rice Wrapper

Add ingredients

Wrap like a burrito

Pan Fry

All Good!

Plenty of fat under the skin. Skin side down. Flip. Remove skin. Then fat side down.

The crispy skin is the best part!

I crisp up the skin fat side down