The One Ingredient To Add To Your Scrambled Eggs Every Morning

Tired of same ol’ breakfast every morning? You don’t have to stick with simple—or bland, dried-out, or just plain disappointing—scrambled eggs when you’re whipping up a morning meal. There’s a better way to cook eggs and pull together an easy breakfast and it’s so simple that all you need to do is add one extra ingredient.

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That ingredient is one you probably already have hanging out in your pantry. So, before you crack open another egg tomorrow morning, skip the milk or olive oil and try something new yet familiar instead. Making this one change can result in richer, creamier, and far tastier eggs that’ll feel so much more hunger-satiating.

The Trick? Add Cornstarch

Leveling up your scrambled eggs is as easy as grabbing the cornstarch that you already have on hand. While you might reserve cornstarch for baking or pulling together a gravy, its thickening nature is exactly what you need to make a better breakfast.

The cornstarch and scrambled eggs combo was popularized in a YouTube video by J. Kenji López-Alt, chef and cookbook author, who traced the original “recipe” back to blogger Mandy Lee. While Lee recommends using tapioca or potato starch, though, López-Alt says cornstarch works just as well.

Here’s what happens when you add cornstarch to scrambled eggs: They go from simple to decadent. Cornstarch is a thickening agent and it takes the liquid-like eggs (and water and butter, but we’ll touch on those in a minute) and turns them into a creamy concoction. They have a seriously improved texture, one that doesn’t feel crumbly and dried-out. 

Instead, your average eggs will stay moist and rich.

The Right Way To Add Cornstarch To Your Scrambled Eggs

Now, before you grab a tablespoon or two of cornstarch and dump it into your scrambled eggs as they cook, it’s important to know that there is a bit of science to it—or a slight recipe, if you will.

Don’t start with eggs; instead, whisk together 1 tablespoon of cold water (or milk or half-and-half, if you prefer) and 1 ½ teaspoons of cornstarch. Once those are combined, add in your fresh eggs (sorry, powdered eggs won’t do the trick) and any seasoning, such as salt, and whisk all of the ingredients again.

Then, you’ll want to add 1 tablespoon of butter per egg to your pan on the stove. If you used three eggs, that’s 3 tablespoons you’ll need to toss in.

Once that butter melts, you can get cooking. Stir your eggs like normal once they hit the pan. Your eggs should turn into a soft, lightly fluffy mixture. They’ll cook just as quickly as you’d expect, but they shouldn’t dry out in the process. 

The end result? A perfectly-cooked, much-improved plate of eggs. And if they don’t turn out as rich as you’d like, you can play with the ratio of water or cornstarch until you get just the right amount of thickening during cooking. Seasoning is also entirely up to you, so you can upgrade your eggs in your favorite ways once you’ve gotten them whisked and on the stovetop.