How to Make 24 Hard-Boiled Eggs in the Oven at Once

If you find yourself needing to cook eggs for a crowd, one pot of boiling water just won’t do. It’s much easier and more convenient to make hard-boiled eggs in the oven when you need to make eggs in bulk. (Plus, you’ll want plenty of space on the stove to prepare bacon, pancakes, hash browns, and other essential breakfast foods.) You could probably argue that this muffin tin hack provides you with “baked” eggs instead of hard-boiled eggs. But truly, there’s little to no difference between stovetop eggs and baked eggs. Both cooking techniques work, but seriously think about it: When you’re cooking eggs for a crowd, would you prefer to fuss over two huge pots of water or stick the eggs all in the oven at once? I’d chose the latter. Every. Single. Time. All you need to do is set the temperature, start the timer, and walk away.

So, the question remains: How do you cook hard boiled eggs in the oven? Start by preheating the oven between 325°F and 350°F. (First timers, it’s definitely worth performing a test run with a few eggs to better understand the perfect temperature for your oven.) Put one whole, unpeeled egg in each of the muffin cups. Bake for 20 to 30 minutes, depending on your desired doneness. Shock the eggs by placing them into a bowl of ice and cold water for a few minutes. Peel when they’re cool enough to handle and the shell will just slide right off.

You might notice little brown marks on the surface of the shell and sometimes, on the whites after peeling. That’s a result of the egg touching the pan while baking. You could try cupcake liners or wrapping cotton or foil around the edges of each hole. But if the marks bother you that much, you could get rid of the muffin tin altogether. Alton Brown makes oven-baked eggs with a moist kitchen towel that’s placed directly on the oven rack and the eggs resting on top. That, however, is a serious fire hazard. To play it safe, either rotate the eggs halfway through cooking or slice off the brown bits after cooking and peeling.

Now, you may be wondering how to store hard-cooked eggs so they’ll stay fresh longer. Hard-cooked eggs in the shell can be kept in the refrigerator for one week. If you’re a fan of peeling all your eggs ahead of time, leave them in a bowl of cold water in the fridge for a week. We also have a trick for reheating hard boiled eggs that doesn’t include the microwave, so no explosion or mess are involved.