11 Ingredients That Will Take Your Fried Eggs To An Unbeatable Level

A little crisp on the white. Runny, jammy, or firm yolk. Plenty of salt and pepper, and don't forget the toast. It's not quite as simple as it seems, though. Cooking the perfect fried egg is something the internet never gets tired of talking about. We have to assume chefs and cooks were having these same conversations for centuries, but that was before websites and YouTube, so it doesn't count. Choosing the right pan for fried eggs is important, sure. The best way to get your fried egg technique to pro level is practice. What about once you've mastered the perfect fried egg, though? Where do you go from there?

The sad reality of life is that even pros plateau. To truly take your fried eggs to legendary status, open your mind to ingredient innovations. Spices, sauces, garnishes — an egg is a marvel on its own, but it's also the perfect vessel for more complex tastes. We've got you covered with these ingredients. Some go in the pan before the egg, some that garnish the top of the egg when it's ready, and some do both.

Scallions, chives, cilantro, parsley — there are tons of underrated herbs you should use more often out there. The dimensions you can add to a dish are vast. Herbs are a clean bite on top of the textural contrast of the egg, with its crisp fried white and either runny or custardy yolk. They're also a welcome addition of color to the breakfast plate. Try frying an egg with the white parts of a scallion in the pan, then topping the whole thing with the uncooked green parts of a scallion. The softened scallion whites will have a more mild flavor, the greens should have a pleasant snap, and the egg glues everything together. Alternatively, you can fry almost the entire scallion in the pan, cook the eggs on top, and have a magical combo to serve over rice. 

The varying flavors of herbs can take your eggs to new genres. Chives are a nod to classic French omelets. Cilantro gestures to huevos rancheros. Again, the possibilities are vast. Fresh herbs are sometimes overlooked by beginner home cooks. Maybe if you live alone, it's hard to justify buying a whole bushel of parsley, only to use a third of it before it goes bad. Once you unlock fresh herbs' potential, though, you never go back.

Salt and pepper are pretty standard when it comes to eggs, for good reason. A world of possibility opens, however, if you think differently. Obviously, you can change what you sprinkle on top of your eggs — it's hard to have a bad time with garlic powder, onion powder, or paprika — but you can also fry eggs on top of seasonings. Gordon Ramsey seasons his butter when making eggs. If that's not enough of a recommendation, well ... We won't yell at you like Gordon's famous for doing, but we will gently encourage you to season whatever fat it is that you're frying eggs in.

One standout spice choice is paprika. The most prominent seasoning in deviled eggs absolutely has a place in the fried variety. Dump some in the pan for a great char on the bottom of your egg — paprika is marvelous for getting color on high heat food. Alternatively, you can sprinkle paprika over the top of the egg, either during the cooking process or immediately after.

You're probably already frying your eggs in butter. Ghee is simply clarified butter — meaning more intense flavoring and higher smoke point. Get both a crispier exterior and more buttery taste with ghee. It's also lactose- and trans fat-free, which should make things easier on your stomach.

That higher smoke point is crucial if you want perfectly fried eggs that don't stick. A cooking technique to employ is basting: start with a decent amount of ghee, get it good and hot, and then spoon the bubbling liquid on top of the egg. This will cook the white from both sides while leaving the yolk nice and runny. Sure, you can do this preparation with any neutral oil, but then you don't get the nutty flavor of ghee. One fat that's really difficult use for the basting preparation is butter, since the required heat will burn your butter before the egg has a chance to reach its full potential.

Heavy cream is already well-known as a great way to get decadent, silky scrambled eggs. Frying in cream, though? Maybe that seems a little far afield. Fear not, we say. Trust in your nonstick pan — in fact, the heavy cream should have some nonstick properties of its own — and make some eggs that will really dance on your taste buds. After all, heavy cream and butter are essentially the same thing, just with different ratios of water, milkfat, sugars, and proteins.

This method leaves you with some caramelized heavy cream that tastes a bit like browned butter. A good use for this extra caramelized cream is frying up some sausages to serve with your eggs. By the time you're plating, your otherwise standard breakfast of eggs and sausage should have a silky dimension that tingles the tongue. One suggestion might be to save this breakfast for a weekend or day off. These levels of richness do not exactly lead to an alert, productive morning.

Eggs are fatty, they demand salt, and they benefit from some heat. But what about acid? Try adding vinegar to fried eggs, and you'll see. Now, vinegar isn't something you can fry the eggs in, per se, but it still goes in the pan. This preparation means frying your eggs in butter (or olive oil, since vinegar and olive oil play well together). Once the eggs are done, slide them onto a plate, then add a spoonful or two of vinegar to the still-warm pan. Allow it to thicken and reduce slightly, then drizzle over your eggs.

If the thought of vinegar spooned over your eggs is still off-putting, consider hot sauce. Everything from Tabasco to Sriracha has varying levels of vinegar at its core.

Eggs are wonderful when served over rice and beans or in taco form. But there's another way to make Mexican-style eggs: Open a jar of salsa, dump some in the pan, let it roast, then fry an egg in the salsa. Keep the heat on the pan medium low to let the salsa get some of those roasted flavors and brown bits. It doesn't need much time; a couple minutes will do. Then, you raise the heat to medium or medium high and add the egg. Sprinkle desired seasonings on the egg, too. You don't want an island of blandness floating in your pool of roasted salsa.

One tip: much like when making shakshuka, a North African egg dish, it helps to make little circle openings in the pan to crack the egg into. A little bit of salsa in these makeshift wells is okay, as it helps to prevent sticking. The more contact the eggs have with the pan, though, the more fried texture you'll get on the bottom. For eating? We recommend ditching the fork and grabbing bites of everything with warm tortillas or chips.

It's no secret that eggs are great when cooked in pork fat. Leftover grease from some crisped-up pig leaves a deeper umami flavor on whatever it touches. In the U.S., this often means cooking with bacon grease. No complaints there — that's a true veteran's move at breakfast. To shake the routine a little, though, try frying some good chorizo. This Spanish take on sausage features warmer spices than your basic breakfast sausage, which are a delightful wake up call on the tongue. If you're the type of person who puts hot sauce in Bloody Marys, definitely fry your eggs in chorizo.

Add the eggs just before the meat is done cooking. The eggs will need their own little wells in the pan, but the grease from the chorizo is absolutely desirable on the bottom of your eggs. Everything should have a vibrant, red-orange hue. The plate should look like a desert sunset. Then, to cut through the heat of the chorizo, serve this dish with some avocado, whether that be with some slices on the side or atop avocado toast.

Sautéed spinach is wonderful on its own, but it can be bitter. Creaminess cuts through that, but why add cream or milk when you can add eggs? That is, of course, provided you leave a little runniness in the yolk. A hard-cooked yolk and spinach is more like something that belongs between two slices of thick, buttered toast. What a versatile preparation this is! We're in really positive territory, here, and we haven't even mentioned all the vitamins, folate, and potassium you'll be getting from the spinach. It's never a bad idea to start your day off with some nutrients.

Spinach and eggs have something crucial in common: They both cook very quickly. That makes this an easy one-pan dish. For this preparation, you'll want to add the spinach first. Grab a couple of big handfuls, enough to fill the pan. Throw seasoning in the leaves, toss them around while they wilt, and when there's space in the pan, add eggs. Season the eggs, too. For a little acidity, a few dashes of hot sauce really ties the plate together.

Chili crisp's emergence in the popular consciousness of U.S. home cooks has been one of the great developments of the 2020s. The wide varieties of chili crisp give you plenty of options for heat and umami levels, with some brands focusing more on chili and others on garlic and onions. Importantly for your eggs, this condiment has dual value as a topping or base. Spoon it over the finished egg for a spicy crunch. 

Alternatively, since chili crisp is mostly oil, onions, and garlic, let it get hot in the pan, then crack the egg over top. You'll want to be careful with how hot you let your pan get. The chili crisp oil should be bubbling, yes, but the heat should not be so high that the condiment burns in the pan. Chili crisp can go from delicious to charred in a matter of seconds. Keep the heat gentle. Once the egg white starts to set, baste the eggs with oil from the pan. A few spoonfuls over top helps get that flavor infused all the way through the egg. Serve with diced scallions and cilantro for some brightness and a little extra color on the plate.

Onions can easily be sliced into circles. Eggs, when cracked, kind of make a circle shape. Why not cook an egg in an onion ring? If you're anything like us, you're wondering why you haven't thought of this before. The end result should come out looking sort of like egg-in-the-hole, only with onion. If you like, it could be a neat little package to scoop onto an English muffin.

Start with high smoke point oil, like canola or avocado oil. Get it hot enough that it will start to fry the onion — otherwise, the onion becomes a soggy mess. Once the onion has started to cook, add your egg. If you've got high enough heat, the bottom of the egg should get good and crispy while the yolk stays jammy. Whether you want to flip the whole package or do a half-fried, half-sunny side up is your choice. One thing this is begging for, though, is toppings. Fresh herbs, crumbled bacon, chili crisp — toppings really complete this one.

The cheese famous for not breaking when it's cooked absolutely demands to have an egg cracked right over top of it in the pan. If you're unfamiliar with halloumi, it's time to get familiar. It's a semi-soft cheese from Cyprus, and it's a cheese you can get grill marks on. The flavor is mild, with some saltiness and tang ensuring your taste buds stay on their toes. It chews almost like cheese curds, sometimes with a pleasant squeak in the teeth.

A Lebanese breakfast preparation would have you heat some olive oil in a pan, brown one side of the halloumi, then flip. Next, crack the egg on top of the cheese, keeping the egg as a second level to the breakfast you're building. Baste the egg with oil from the pan until the white sets. Of course, you want the crunch of traditional fried eggs, that's easy, too. Simply pan fry the cheese, then slide it onto your plate when both sides are brown. Fry your eggs in the remaining cheese-infused oil, then plate the egg over the cheese.