Perfect hard-boiled eggs

How to make perfect hard-boiled eggs:

1. Fill a pot with water.  Add copious amounts of salt, at least 1/4 cup.
2. Put fresh eggs into the water and put on to boil.
3. Walk away while the water is heating.  Get dressed.  Do your makeup.  Fix hair.  Forget all about the eggs.  Wonder what that noise is in the kitchen.
4. Investigate the noise.  Remember the eggs.
5. Turn off heat.  On a wild guess, set timer for three minutes.
6. Forget to hit "start."
7. Five minutes later, realize that the timer never got set.
8. Rinse eggs with cold water.

Well, that's how I did it this morning, anyway.  I got lucky, despite being a pre-coffee nimwit.

Ugly but delicious salad

Normally my method is more like this:

1. Fill a pot with water.  Add copious amounts of salt, at least 1/4 cup.
2. Put fresh eggs into the water and put on to boil.
3. Once water comes to a boil, turn off the heat and slap on a lid.
4. Set timer for 9-10 minutes.
5. When the timer goes off, rinse the eggs in cold water.

Why so much salt?  I've found that it helps prevent the eggs from sticking to the membrane.  We have urban hens, and thus very fresh eggs.  All the stories of vinegar, pricking eggs with pins, etc., have never worked for me.  But a lot of salt does work.

Have you tried the canning jar salads?  I made up three of them this morning.  Score: my lunches are made for over half of the week.  Double-score: I entered one into my sparkpeople.com account and they're all set for the next 2 days.