Yes. Not always, but at least this time I did. In fact I wondered if that was part of the problem. I hate to belabor the point; it was not the worst thing that happened this week.
On further review, the third egg did have a defect, I thought because some egg white was extruded, maybe because I pierced the shell. It was otherwise fine, and easy to peel.
I think this is the one of three “pristine” egg; first out of the ice bath. It
could be the other side of the extruded egg.
Just use sous vide - consistency/reproducibility problem solved
The green ring is supposed to be from overcooking. I’ve often thought about getting an egg cooker, but I really have way too many appliances already.
if the shell has any cracks - usually due to mechanical handling - when the gases inside the egg expand, the white is forced out into the stringy bits.
the large end of the end has an ‘air sac’ - poking the hole in the large end allows the gases inside the egg to expand without breaking the shell.
one could theorize that not poking a hole would cause the egg to expand / be more readily ‘stuck’ onto the inner membrane - bu that’s just a theory.
Yep, that was my point. Except for the dedicated egg steamer, I’ve used every single method and most of the combinations listed here. Seriously.
Like I said, steaming in the instant pot was the most successful, but they cooked a couple of minutes too long, hence the green ring, which wouldn’t really bother me except for the esthetics.
Mainly, I just posted this subject to vent. 
Speaking of Kenji and Serious Eats, I gleaned this nugget from the “long version” of his recipe:
“Thus, for perfect hard-cooked eggs, you want whites that don’t cook much beyond 180°F (82°C) and yolks that have just hit 170°F (77°C) throughout. Cooking relatively gently allows for this, but easy peeling requires a full 212°F blast of heat.”
Kenji’s method starts with cold eggs lowered into already-boiling water. But boiled only for 30 seconds. His theory is that this is strictly to make peeling easier.
Then the boil is broken (either by moving the pot or adding ice cubes), and reducing the heat to a simmer setting for a prescribed time.
Then, if the eggs are to be served cold, they spend at least 15 minutes in an icebath.
This got me thinking. Why not just shock the eggs for the prescribed 30-second boil and then transfer to a sous vide bath set to the ideal finished yolk temperature? In other words, key off the yolk, and rely on the carryover from the boil to set the whites. That way the yolks will never be overcooked no matter how long they’re in the bath, avoiding the green tinge issue. Thence into an icebath if you want.
the problem with long period sous vide cooking for eggs …
the white and the yolk congeal/cook at different temperatures.
bringing the entire egg to one single uniform temperature . . .
. . . depending on how one likes one’s egg, it can be a totally unworkable solution.
The ice bath makes all the difference in the world in my experience. At least when using the Egg Central.
I put the hot eggs into ice water and wait 1 minute. I can peel almost all of them in one piece. The eggs peel in about 20 seconds.
If I peel a hot egg I won’t have any egg to eat.
Me = 
= 
totally agree - water with ‘all the ice that will fit’ is the trick.
this is from some years earlier discussion (somewhere…)
the “crater” on the left egg results from the whites 'setting up" around the (remaining) air sac . . .
When using the Egg Central a hole is poked in the small end. Or at least I do. 
Over on CH, Ricepad provided the explanation for why you get different results peeling hard boiled eggs, and Olunia posted it here on H.O., with his permission.
uhmmmm, poking the small end would defeat the kitchen lore reason for poking a hole…
just saying…
@hungryonion can this title be edited to include HB eggs, or tagged to include them. Prob wont show up in search otherwise. Thanking you!
Maybe I’ve been doing it wrong all along - like the way I hold my iPhone. No harm thus far. 
Yes, egg white and yolk congeal at different temperatures. That happens regardless of cooking method.
However and fortunately, they also cook from the outside in, i.e., the heat moves inward by conduction. This is true for all methods, except microwave, which penetrates a limited distance.
If you set your SV bath at 180F (Kenji’s ideal temp for whites), the whites would never overcook. But you would have to be careful with time, and chill the eggs before the yolks overcook and become chalky.
What I was proposing is to utilize the very short boil’s carryover heat (and theoretically a bit longer time in the hot water), and then SV at 170F. Immersion in the SV bath won’t immediately cool the white, and some heat will continue moving inward. But in a 170F bath , the concern over overcooking the yolk is eliminated.
I just put eggs in water, boil for about 5 minutes, turn off and let sit until coolish. I remove eggs and bash the fat end and let sit in cold water. Peel like a glove.
rather like poking a hole in the small end . . . defeats the purpose of the intent…
I’m not following, sorry.
as I am given to understand . . . the big ‘advantage / feature’ of sous vide cooking is
“set the water temp and forget about it”
so . . . using sous vide set at 180’F but having to be careful of the time (180’F yolks are not to everyone’s taste…) defeats the purpose of carefree cooking, no?
and, since water is pretty consistently 212’F when boiling,
and, since one is watching the time anyway,
isn’t that the same version of sous vide at 180’F and watching the time?
You’ve been given to misunderstand. It’s common in SV cookery to have an end time, at which the bag is to be removed. In fact, I’'ve never seen a prep to the effect “forget about it, you can go as long as you want.” Many foods will degrade if you leave them in the bath too long.
And–as we’ve been discussing–whole eggs are a mixed food. You could be making, e.g., succotash or rattatoile , dishes with several different vegetable constituents that optimally cook at different rates and temperatures. If you’re totally anal (like Tom Keller), you do these things separately and differently, then perhaps combine them as a last cooking step. Or add them to cook in a specific order.
Of course you can’t cook white and yolk separately and afterward put Humpty Dumpty back together. So you have to resort to embracing an “outside in” approach.
Nothing about Kenji’s method is carefree to start with. Boil for 30 seconds, then kill the boil with ice cubes (or ladle into already simmering water for the prescribed time. Then an icebath for 15 minutes. What I’m pondering with SV isn’t a lot more additional work.
The problem with “just boiling” is that the temperature is so high that the time window for getting peeling ease and optimum doneness in that binary food becomes very short. Kenji’s method stretches the time by quickly slowing the heat input to better conduct heat into the delicate center of the food, namely the yolk.
