Too thick to boil an egg? Buy 'em preboiled

Having been relieved of the burden of having to make a jam sandwich, those without either the time or the intellectual capacity for basic culinary tasks can now avail themselves of the latest word in labour-saving foodstuffs: Preboiled free range eggs. Happy Egg Company pack of preboiled eggs Yup, the Happy Egg Company will, …

[abigsmurf]

Is this notable?

I'm sure you've been able to buy boiled eggs as a lunch snack in the supermarket in the same fridge where you get pasties and scotch eggs. Am I missing something?

[Anonymous Coward]

One can only hope...

...They're too dim to be able to put food in their face holes.

[Anonymous Coward]

You're yolking right???

Nuff said. Crap pun.

[Richard 81]

Well

We already have pre-cooked sausages. Why not eggs too?

I don't personally carry a saucepan and portable stove when mooching around town. Even so, perhaps I might feel a lunch time urge to partake of a snack eggy. Perhaps with said cold sausages. Add some bread and you merely eating the ingredients for a scotch egg anyway, without it having been fried.

[Anonymous Coward]

Good for paraplegics etc

Seems excessive, but for people with certain disabilities boiling an egg could well be quite a hassle.

An apple in cling film on a polystyrene tray, labelled "citrus product", as one motorway service station saw fit, seems more offensive.

And, yes, not quite sure where the IT angle is for this, although it's way too obvious I know...

[T-Bone]

Pre-boiled eggs.

Can they be re-heated?

[Ray0x6]

The douche that laid the golden egg

People are so goddamned lazy that this product will probably be a massive hit.

IT angle?

[Anonymous Coward]

So....

Who's going to be the first person to write to the company congratulating them on what a wonderful product they have, inquiring how they make the eggs so round, but requesting they make them runny and in the hard white packets next time since they bought the eggs to make an omelet, only were unable to do so in spite of several attempts by them and their mother/friend/boss/doctor useing instructions from a number of different recipe books?

Preferably in the style of AMFM.

[Sarah Baucom]

Endian issue

Do the instructions say which end to eat first? If not, I'll have to find my pre-boiled/shelled eggs elsewhere.

Paris, because she probably couldn't boil an egg.

[Anonymous Coward]

How can it be boiled to perfection ?

When its cold. Boiled to perfection means cooked white and hot runny yoke....

HOMER MODE. Hmmmmmm yolk!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Spot the Cat]

I give up

I give up. I despair. I've lost the will to live. And the worst thing is some fuckwit will buy them.

[Benj]

Shelled! What the hell do you mean?

Are you really trying to teach us that the hard exterior can be removed BEFORE eating. I just thought they were naturally crunchy.

Next you'll be telling us there's a way to drink wine without having to suck it through the cork.

You learn something new every day.

./Paris. Because when asked, "What came first, the chicken or the egg?" She just cried because her head hurt.

[Chris 219]

We're doomed.

How can someone NOT have "the knack" of boiling an egg?

In the time Joe Moron would take to figure out how to order his pre-boiled eggs and have them delivered to his nearest Asda, drive there, queue to pay for them, drive back (how do these people pass a driving test BTW?) , and unpack them from their unnatural plastic container, poor feckless Joe could have actually BOILED THEIR OWN EGGS and shelled them! And what's the betting the packing is harder to open than the "inconvenient" shell anyway?

Do such people really exist? If so, how likely is it that they will have sufficient noggin to be discerning enough to care about the free range provenance of the eggs they're about to eat (subject to half-hour round trip to go and buy them)?

Doomed I tells ya :D

Paris, cos even she wouldn't need to buy this product.

[eJ2095]

Well

You will have the supermarker providing your with the "Bread soldiers" next to dip into it......

Picture it now 1 slice of bread £1 please.....

[Duncan Hothersall]

I swear that several years back

in M&S in Inverness I saw peeled oranges packed in plastic bags on sale.

[Peter Kay]

Not too bad an idea, actually.

It does sound quite useful for impromptu picnics and suchlike and it's not really that expensive.

Yes, it's not cheap, but the price is roughly similar to that of six free range fresh eggs. Fresh eggs have a long shelf life and high demand. Hard boiled eggs have a shorter shelf life and lower demand due to the more limited number of uses.

I could probably think of a number of things that really are supremely lazy even if the only cooking equipment you possess is a microwave. Pre made baked potatoes with filling are probably top of that list. The blasphemy that is any form of squeezable bottle sauce. Preprepared vegetables (washed spinach, carrot batons, but not pre-made stir fries : they're actually more economic than buying the individual ingredients in supermarkets. madness.). etc.

[Another Anonymous Coward 1]

I'd buy it.

Makes sense really, 30p premium or so per egg to save the hassle of...

Filling kettle, putting it on, waiting for it to boil, taking it off, putting on hob, adding egg carefully, waiting for it to cook, taking it out, putting it under cold water for a bit, then carefully spending the next minute or so peeling off the damn shell and all the fiddly little bits that get left on if you mess it up.

So, 30p to save 2 minutes of effort.

For these eggs to be worthwhile on a logical "time = money" basis, you would have to be earning over £9/hour. For anyone earning less than that, boiling your own eggs is a much more sensible investment.

I also like those little cheese slices (not american cheese), and pre-chopped/ peeled/ washed carrots.. much less faffing about involved.

[Si 1]

This seems like too much work for me...

Can someone please start producing pre-digested food for me so I can skip the time consuming eating and digesting part so I can just put the food straight in the toilet?

(Shamelessly stolen from a Ben Elton routine from a few years back)

[Simon 6]

I'm simply stunned

That this country has grown so thick that even boiling an egg is beyond them.

This could actually work well as a tactic to route out the dregs of the gene pool. Anyone purchasing this should be arrested at the till, taken out the back and shot.

[Robert Ramsay]

Never mind the preboiled egg...

what about the pre-grated cheese?

[Anonymous Coward]

Odds and Sods

As mentioned all the time Odd's and Sod's dont need a IT angle!

[Sebastian Brosig]

Shelf life?

Eggs don't keep once they're boiled. Raw eggs keep well even without refrigeration.

[Bernie 2]

That's eggceptional.

Well not really I just wanted to say it.

[SuperTim]

Not new

I have a big jar of pickled eggs at home.......Slurp!

[Anonymous Hero]

Prior art...?

Jars of pickled eggs? Eggs wrapped in sausage or mystery meat? Or did I miss something?

Paris...because she likes her eggs covered in tatty water.

[Bassey]

"pre" boiled?

As the prefix "Pre" means BEFORE, surely a preboiled egg is an egg before it's been boiled. Or, in fact, just "an egg". If it's also been shelled I would hope it arrives in a little plastic bag.

A few years ago, the idea of someone selling boiled eggs would have been surprising. Today, it's rather "meh". I know catering wholesalers have been offering such for a long time. Sandwich shops will happily buy cheap, boiled, shelled eggs for making egg-mayo etc. But at 45p per egg, I can't really see these taking off.

[Rob 63]

what about

the toast?! where can i buy a piece of toast to go with it??!? whats the matter with these people FFS!!

[Steve Mason]

could be worse...

Aunt Bessies are selling frozen jacket potatoes... I mean it's a potato... stick it in the oven, it's not rocket surgery :P

I wouldn't mind if you could nuke it in the microwave for 3 mins for a nice crispy spud, but no, you have to cook it in the oven for almost as long as you would anyway... basically, it's a frozen potato, sheesh!!

[Dan 10]

Missed a trick

If you wish for people to pick up these as a healthy alternative snack, you've missed a trick: It needs to be sold with a little dip of salad cream. Hard boiled eggs on their own are too dry.

This is making me hungry.

[Anonymous Coward]

Been there already

@AC 14:59 You can buy eggs like this in Japan, but they come with the shell still on, imagine our disappoint when we went to make fried eggs for breakfast one morning and find out some bastard's already boiled them. In my defense, the packaging was all in Japanese ... although the fish sausage we bought by accident was slightly worse ...

[david bates]

Pickled eggs

FTW.

They're the only sort of hard boiled eggs worth bothering with. Pandora for preference, although Im not that fussy.

[Daniel 1]

Free range eggs

In so much non-recycleable plastic packaging that it makes an Easter egg look eco-friendly. They've a curious demographic, that they're after, and that's for sure! I hope the eggs come, as illustrated on the outside of the packaging - already sliced in half - or they could be done under the trade's description act. After all, it's so hard to slice a hard boiled egg in half without at least one of the yokes crumbling and falling out.

Mind you, the packaging looks so infernally byzantine, it probably requires so much brute force to get at the eggs, that there's nothing but yellow power and white rubbery stuff, left, by the time you're done.

[Anonymous Coward]

@Robert Ramsay

I'd rather do the washing up resulting from boiling eggs than grating cheese.

Terminator 'cos it's had a nasty skin removal incident as well.

[BlueGreen]

I'm sure I have prior art

<http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/02/18/jam_sarnie/comments/#c_430864>

Still reckon off-the-peg jam sarnie punting beats all.

[OkKTY8KK5U]

Pre-whatevered food

So, how long until someone takes this to its logical conclusion and markets "pre-digested food" for the hungry executive on the go who doesn't have time for all that tedious chewing, swallowing, and peristalsis?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm all for it

"A fool and his money..."

[JCL]

eggs 'n' that

@Duncan Hothersall, I saw them in London - peeled oranges and sliced apples. I also saw an egg sandwich filling that had "Caution, may contain eggs" on the side. Then there's the very very long egg that they put into the middle of pork pies, not to mention "cheese substitute" and predigested cheese-style paste (cheez wizz).

[Cameron Colley]

Forget to think before posting anyone?

So, all you clever people always make a packed lunch when travelling? Even when you're on expenses, it's last minute, or you're not sure how long you'll be gone? Or do you carry a stove and a pan instead?

Are people stupid for going to restaurants, chip shops, or takeaways?

Yes, the article pitching these as being for people too stupid to boil an egg was funny, but there are clearly other reasons than stupidity and laziness to buy these.

[Pablo]

@Bassey

Pre- does mean before, but it can either mean "before being boiled" or "boiled beforehand". The latter use has been increasingly popular, but it's not strictly a neologism. People have been pre-heating their ovens for a long time.

[IR]

Whatever next?

Soon you'll be able to buy cups of tea or coffee, already made. And orange juice, without having to squeeze oranges. Etc.

The world is crazy.

[Chris Seiter]

What came first?

What came first, the chicken or the egg?

Actually, the rooster did.

[Real Ale is Best]

Yuck

I saw some cooked mashed potato in Tesco the other day. This country is getting so incapable, people are going to have to have devices to tell them to breathe in and out...

[Anonymous Coward]

Hopefully...

These will be placed alongside the pre-peeled oranges (no really) and bottled water, so the terminally stupid don't have to wander too far from the carers.

[Anonymous Coward]

Well if your all going to be all serious

It's an way of selling grade 2 eggs which have less attractive shells at better then grade 1 prices.

That was even boring to write.

[Robajob]

That's un oeuf egg puns

That is all.

[Richard IV]

The latest variant of the old Linda Smith gag

"Tuna flakes: for people too stupid to use a fork"

[adam 21]

Better than a deep fried mars bar

Good idea and not just for the lazy people. Known some body builders who eat a lot of hard boiled eggs, 20+ per day so it generally makes sense for them. Also seems better than the rest of the crap that is on offer as on the move munchies, it's difficult to ruin a hard boiled egg after all.

[Anonymous Coward]

@Peter Kay

Same price as raw free range eggs. You don't support you local farmers market do you? I buy 6 extra large free range eggs for £1.20 (20p each) at £1.49 for 4 that's (38p each) or nearly twice the price.

[4HiMarks]

Cannibalism

Did anyone look at the "story" on the web site? That chicken is boiling her children alive!

Something like that would be great for making a big plate of perfect deviled eggs for a party.

[Anonymous Coward]

'Free range' or 'free to roam'

"free to roam on green pasture and are equipped with perching platforms and sandpits to enhance the birds' natural surroundings"

Are they crammed in a large shed, fed food & water (but free to nip out of the little hole in the wall to find sandpits & perches where food & water is not provided)?

[jake]

Seen this.

Cooked, pre-shelled eggs are available at various local stores here in Sonoma (well, I'm in Fort Bragg at the moment, but the local Harvest Market sells 'em too) ... mostly they sell to the tourists. As a convenience item when you are away from home, I see no problem with it.

What gets me is pre-chopped veggies for stir fry at a ~8X markup. Seriously ... 98 cents worth of onion and bell pepper for $7.99 ... or the "party platter" containing about $1.99 worth of pre-cut carrots, celery, broccoli and cauliflower and about a half cup of Ranch Dressing for $17.99 ... Is chopping veg really THAT hard?

Then there is the pre-washed, individually wrapped `organic` potato "ready for the microwave or oven", for the low, low price of $4.99 ... Yuppies are stupid.

[Anonymous Coward]

@Benj

'Next you'll be telling us there's a way to drink wine without having to suck it through the cork'

Silly man, you get Paris to suck the cork out...

[Pete 2]

@Chris 219

> How can someone NOT have "the knack" of boiling an egg?

To be fair, they don't come with instructions either on the egg, nor on the box. And (looking at the pack I bought last week) there's no warning about cooking them first, nor eating the shells either.

I would therefore expect that having everything done for you, by treating the purchaser as if they were a small child ("come on Johnny, eat your eggs, they're yummy") will make them a runaway success. Assuming of course that the purchasers have enough intelligence to work out how to open the packaging. Hmmm, better make that a "measured" success.

[Anonymous Coward]

"Serving suggestions" re Bootnote

>" Anyone out there who's too thick even to work out what to do with an egg that someone else has boiled for them should note that "as well as being eaten on their own, the eggs can be chopped and served in sandwiches or as part of a summer salad". "

What I just love is all that pre-packaged pre-cooked food that comes with lovely bright pictures on the packaging and the printed phrase "Serving suggestion". Which sounds like some kind of a recipe, but is in fact usually just a euphemism for "Rip off the lid and slap it on a plate."

[Anonymous Coward]

Wow just wow

And I thought the human race couldn't get much more lazy than it already is. However we now have people actively marketing not just pre-boiled, no no but also pre-shelled eggs. Because taking the shells off the eggs is faaaaaaaaaaaaar to difficult isn't it? WTF people, seriously WHAT THE FUCK??

I think I need a ticket on the first rocket ship headed to mars because even if the aliens eat my face at least I'll be away from the kind of sheer stupidity and laziness that feels the NEED pre made jam sandwiches and pre boiled/shelled eggs. It just seriously boggles my mind.

[Anonymous Coward]

But.......

....I prefer mine fried.... let's see them package 'ready-fried' eggs... on second thoughts

[adnim]

For the real lazy...

I can see a market for pre-digested foodstuffs, perhaps even pre-regurgitated for the bulimic consumer.

[Bill Cumming]

what's new...?

My local Supermarket has been selling a pack of 2 shelled boiled eggs for a few years now! Great for when you want to make up a quick salad when heading out for the day (the pre-made salad boxes never have enough eggs or cherry tomato in them for my liking... )

[Anonymous Coward]

Err what?

Several people have pointed out that carrying a saucepan and burner around may not be practical and therefore this might even make sense. Someone else asked if this isn't an old idea - after all boiled eggs have been around for a while in supermarkets.

If it's just that, then okay, I get it and that's cool. You're out and about, forgot to make yourself a pack lunch so you pop into Asda for a snack.

But what I got from this was they boil YOUR eggs for you. In other words you take the eggs you bought previously to the store and they return them boiled. Is it just me or does that not sound like something that would take longer than the 4 minutes (plus time to bring the water to a boil) you need to hard boil egg the normal way?

How to (soft) boil an egg perfectly every time

------------------------------------------------------------

Okay if you really don't know how to do this.. I'll be facetious and tell you.

1/You boil the water first. That's right, you bring the water to a boil with NO eggs in it.

2/Throw in about a teaspoon of salt - it helps prevent the shell from cracking and bursting before you pull out the egg.

3/Once you can see some vigorous bubbling and steaming, your water is boiling. Look at your watch or a clock. Write down the time if you're a pot head and have no short term memory.

4/Put your egg(s) into the water.

5/Wait precisely 3 minutes. Not longer, not less, 3 minutes.

6/Pull out the egg and put it in an egg cup.

7/Take off the top 1/4 of the egg.

8/Put your spoon into the egg.

9/Notice that your egg has been perfectly soft boiled.

10/Wait.. I wanted a hard boiled egg, I'm totally screwed, what can I do?!? Nothing, because you've already opened your egg and unless you like some sort of fucked up poached egg deal with no yoke you'll just have to eat it.

Notes

Some people do indeed prefer their eggs HARD boiled. This is particularly tricky as it take an entire extra minute to go from soft boiled to hard boiled. That's 4 minutes.. or less time than it takes most people to deliver two eggs to Asda and wait for them to have your eggs returned hard boiled.

[Anonymous Coward]

Has its uses...

I actually like the variety of pre-made food. Not because I need it or buy it, but because I like having the option of doing so. Will I ever buy preboiled eggs? Probably not. But if I end up on a picnic and it turns out I've forgotten the eggs, I'd rather grab some pre-boiled ones from a local store than travelling all the way home.

Best thing is: These options are financed by people who are too lazy/stupid to boil eggs on a regular bases (because otherwise, they wouldn't sell these things).

Love that way of harnessing stupidity/laziness for more emergency options!

[Donald Miller]

As usual, you're behind the colonies.

These have been available here in the American boondocks for well more than a year. I have no idea what they cost, having been taught to cook eggs (and kill, clean and cook chickens) on my parents' farm back before the Revolution.

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm moving...

I'm going to have to move outside the asylum now; I might even get toothpick instructions engraved on a sign above the door.

Oh, by the way... which came first, chicken or egg? quite clearly it was the egg... dinosaurs had eggs.

[Robert E A Harvey]

whot?

Packs of pre-boiled eggs - de-shelled or in brightly coloured shells - have been a feature of German supermarkets for years.

[N2]

What next?

Pre-digested eggs...

no, I wont go on

[Doug Glass]

What's Next?

I see a trend, no longer having to service your wife or significant other. Oh sorry, my bad, that's a profession already in place.

Dang, and here I was getting ready to gear up for a new profession ... the world's oldest. And well, paying for pre-boiled and pre-shelled eggs is just another way of getting f**ked by large corporations anyway.

Now if we could just mount a chicken on the counter top and get the egg's insides without the shell by jerking the chicken's neck I'd be happy. Just jerk the neck a few times and out comes the yolk and white ready for cooking. Now why does that sound so familiar? Oh well, jerking the chicken will never catch on. Too much effort required and probably too messy in the long run.

[Balefire]

To all the detractors out there

I'm sorry, but leaving aside the lazy aspect of it, this is a work of sheer genius! Have you looked at their website? I have and I couldn't believe it. There was something charming and vaguely childish about the whole thing.

Personally I wouldn't buy them as I prefer my eggs with the shells still slightly soft and warm from the chickens bum, but I could see the attraction for a quick snack at lunchtime.

[Anonymous Coward]

I think this article has tapped

a hitherto unmined seam of hard core cookwit readership.

Can we have a recipe section?

None of you hard line cooktards buy egg sandwiches, then?

[David Shanahan]

I Only Watch Her For the Recipes

Nigella Lawson, Jamie Oliver and that swearing guy must be crying into their caviar at the thought of this product.

[Walking Turtle]

Been done.

@AC Tuesday 7th July 2009 14:59

"Who's going to be the first person to write to the company congratulating them on what a wonderful product they have, inquiring how they make the eggs so round, but requesting they make them runny and in the hard white packets next time since they bought the eggs to make an omelet, only were unable to do so in spite of several attempts by them and their mother/friend/boss/doctor useing instructions from a number of different recipe books?..."

See "Idiot Letters" byPaul Rosa (isbn 0-386-47508-x) for the Inside Scoop and real-life hardcopy on and of that very fine culture-jammin' artform. (One might later realize that one has not wanted for tee shirts nor coffee mugs for many years now, one day, but it is not wise to hold the breath for so very long.)

"...Preferably in the style of AMFM."

[josh] Um, is that the premium dashboard radio option on this rig? Can I get a Blaupunkt in-dash all-in-one, with MWSW too? [/josh]

I for one tend think amfM, on the other hand, might have even more Advancedly Intelligent (likely non-faulty too) things to take up and/or do.

Just to call the man by his right name. A distinction with a difference. Recognition is sweet. To go is to return etc inter alia et seq et al.

Mine's the one with the roll of international postage stamps and box of envelopes in one pocket, and a portable replicator for quasi-garbly Latin-derived Infinitely Inclusive Meme Abbreviations in the other. (Touch gently; teeth like cats...)

[Sarah Baucom]

Not as bad as

frozen peanut butter and jelly sandwiches with the crust cut off. They've been selling those in the US for years. PB&J was already the lazy lunch to begin with, but I guess some people can't be bothered to spend 30 seconds making and wrapping one.

[Adrian Esdaile]

Very distrubing website - cannibal chickens

Visit their website; they have a cute little animation of chickens boiling eggs (errr....) and then chickens going off to work with eggs in their lunchbox!

Ahhhhh! Cannibal chickens!

[Big-nosed Pengie]

What...

...you mean I still have to chew them?????

[Glen Turner 666]

St Delia predicted this

I remember the fuss when Delia Smith's "How to Cook" TV show started with boiling an egg. Seems to me the recipe wasn't unnecessary after all.

Paris, because she likes her eggs as nature intended them.

[Steve 114]

Eggstra Time

A visiting USian cousin asked how to boil an egg because at home the help does it for her. We offered her the plastic colour-changing block that models heat integration, or the tune-playing immersible egg-shaped timer that 'sets' from boil-point. Now *there's* an IT dimension.

[jake]

@AC 21:28

"a hitherto unmined seam of hard core cookwit readership."

Eh? Do you really think "hacking" doesn't include playing with the very thing that keeps you alive? If you have a problem with combining time, ingredients, +/-heat and pleasing display on a plate in order to please both your palate & your nearest & dearest's ... well, all I can say is that I feel sorry for you. And even sorrier for your nearest & so-called dearest.

"Can we have a recipe section?"

Recipes have been posted more than several times here on ElReg. Here's another ...

Hard cooked eggs:

1 dozen eggs in 5 quarts of cold water. Throw in a handful of salt (4 Tbs or so). Bring to a rolling boil, then closely cover and take off the heat. Let stand covered for 14 minutes, then plunge into icewater for 15 minutes or so. Dry and refrigerate for up to three weeks before using.

"None of you hard line cooktards buy egg sandwiches, then?"

Absofuckinglutely never. I make my own. Eggs from the henhouse down the street. I bake my own bread. I make my own aioli (with or without garlic, depending). Pickling is trivial. I make my own mustard. It's not hard to keep a kitchen/pantry full of ingredients that can be combined to make food ... unless you're too much of a fuckwit to realize that cooking in essential to life, and thus a good skill to figure out.

[Michael 28]

Scotch egg...

....without the sausagemeat...

wonder if this is the halal /kosher version?

[Anonymous Coward]

IT Angle

I'm sure I'm not the only one who has lusers -particularly managers - that aren't bright enough to boil an egg...

In some cases I'm not sure they'd even 'recognise' an egg unless it was presented to them in some form of labeled packaging.

I'm be more than happy to offer them some advice on where exactly they can stick their egg too - especially if it's hot.

[jon 72]

Fight back!

What would BOFH and the PFY do if thier lunch break was cut back to 30 minutes in line with the rest of the sheep by the bean counters. Would they descend to the depths of scoffing pre boiled eggs and jam sandwichs in wrapped in clingfilm at thier desks?

[TeeCee]

This "Happy Egg" mob.

Is that a shell company?

[Fluffykins]

I can go one step further

How about "Pre-Eaten Egg?"

It's kinda brown, so I gave it the second name: "Chocolate Surprise"

Why? Well, I'd be surprised if it's chocolate.

[Anonymous Coward]

Anonymous Coward 7th July 2009 18:20 GMT

Thanks I just scolded my hand now I'm going to sue

[Anonymous Coward]

@ Doug Glass

You sick peverted B**tard you owe me a new keyboard, mouse, monitor array and large mug of coffee

[Peter Kay]

@AC 'farmers markets'

You're comparing apples to oranges. That's like saying prices in Netto and Waitrose are different - no surprise there.

No, I don't go to farmers markets. There's a reason supermarkets are successful : they stock a wide range of food, at a basically reasonable cost (albeit sometimes overpriced or packaged in inflexible quantities), in an acceptable location (near to home and work) and most importantly : at a reasonable time (either close by during lunch hour, or at a convenient time for me that doesn't take up my weekend).

As a matter of interest, I tried searching for a local farmers market via www.farmersmarket.net and it found nothing. Despite the fact I know there's one in Manchester and various markets, probably of the non farmers type, nearby.

Is it really a surprise supermarkets are successful given the above? I don't deny farmers markets have some decent produce, but there's no way I'm going back to small overpriced local shops with a restricted range or more specialist shops that require a substantial journey time, that are only viable if you go occasionally and do a large shop of unusual items.

I do use local shops where it's reasonable to do so, but it's the exception rather than the rule.

[Nick Wallis]

Supermarkets to sell pre-digested food

Turd-To-Go

http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/news/business/supermarkets-to-sell-pre%11digested-food-200907081887/

Genius.

[Richard 39]

@ Err what? #

You forgot to explain to the retards that when taking the egg out of the boiling water they use a ladle or a spoon, not their bare hands

[Jimbo 6]

Fools and their money...

Reminds me of the 'Microwave-in-the-bag carrot batons' (nb 'batons', not 'sticks' !*) I spotted in Marks & Sparks some years back - a snip at only £1 for about half a pound (227g to you, young 'un) of Bugs' favourite nibbles - about 10 times the price of actually buying some whole ones and doing a minute's scrubbing and chopping.

*Bart: Wow! Can I see your club?

Lou: It's called a baton, son.

Bart: Oh. What's it for?

Lou: We club people with it.

[Bod]

Sainsbury Local / Tesco Extra etc

I can see this as a bad thing especially for customers of the small "local" Sainsbury/Tesco places which already chuck out most "ingredient" products in favour of overpriced flavourless lazy-ass ready made products for those too lazy or too thick to even cope with cooking the simplest of foods.

So out will go the boxes of eggs and in come pre-boiled eggs.

How will I make my Yorkshires now? Ah, but these places have overpriced "tastes like cardboard" bloody Aunt Bessies lazy-ass things they claim to be Yorkshires!!

What's the betting they're laid by chickens in Bolivia, shipped to Honduras by air to pre-boil them, and then shipped to the UK for packaging before shipping to the supermarkets?

What next? Pre-boiled tea and breakfast cereals with the milk already in? They can do away with stocking milk then.

[P. Lee]

Target Demographics

Anyone who wasn't prepared with their packed lunch, but who has discovered its still cheaper to buy boiled eggs and a loaf of bread than it is to support the corporate rip-off merchants flogging egg sandwiches for £2 with an ingredients list which has "bread" listed in quotes, at the office from their mini-vans.

I have to get up at 5:30am to beat the commuter traffic jams. I am not getting up 5 minutes earlier just to boil an egg!

But no, I've never bought one.

[Daniel Owen 1]

available in the US for years

I have seen pre-boiled eggs in the deli for years here in the US. They are always sitting in little plastic bags looking kind of disgusting so at least the packaging is an improvement.

[Anonymous Coward]

Too thick to boil an egg?

Must be an Apple user.

[Jesse Dorland]

Sadly they do exists!

In fact, I had the misfortune of dating such a girl. I couldn't believe it. She didn't even know how to wash dishes! I kid you not. I would suggest to this company to market their products in Canada, they will be making money hand over fist.

[Anonymous Coward]

@ Anonymous Coward

'What I just love is all that pre-packaged pre-cooked food that comes with lovely bright pictures on the packaging and the printed phrase "Serving suggestion". Which sounds like some kind of a recipe, but is in fact usually just a euphemism for "Rip off the lid and slap it on a plate."'

Believe it or not, it's a legal get-out; by putting 'serving suggestion' next to a picture of a delicious egg with buttered soldiers they protect themselves from morons who might sue them expecting to find spread and the Light Infantry inside the carton.

[asiaseen]

Just hope they're not fakes

At about the same time as the melamine milk scandal, there was an additional panic in China over eggs that were allegedly faked. I still haven't worked out how it was possible.

[Anonymous Coward]

If these are for people who are too stupid to boil an egg...

Then are pre-cooked pies for people who are too stupid to make a pie?

Are pre-built cars for people who are too stupid to build a car?

I think the expression you want here is "lazy" or "otherwise too busy".

[Joe Flynn]

OH

OH MY GOD! What's next, premade sandwiches? Imagine that, people too stupid to put some ham and cheese between some bread!