A big knob of butter

I don’t know when I started doing it. But for as long as I can remember I’ve always used milk when cooking scrambled eggs. Maybe my parents showed me. Maybe I read it somewhere. I’ve got no idea. But now, I’ve changed. I no longer use milk.

What caused the change? Well. Molly read something about how chefs make scrambled eggs. Apparently, according to these chefs, the milk does nothing for the eggs. In fact, it makes them worse. It dilutes the flavour. It weakens the colour. It increases the cooking time. There’s no upside to the presence of milk in your scrambled eggs. They say that all you need is the eggs and a big knob of butter. We decided to try this. So yesterday morning we left the milk out, and you know what? The eggs were great. 

You might wonder why I’m sharing this with you. Here’s why. I like learning big lessons from little episodes, finding revelations in seemingly irrelevant places. And there’s a lesson in this saga of milk and eggs.

The milk is an ingredient that has no actual effect on the outcome of the eggs. If anything, it detracts from the final result. And if something doesn’t add, if something doesn’t contribute, what should we do? Remove it. That goes for milk. That goes for activities we perform every day and every week. That goes for processes and systems we use in our workflow. That applies to how we use our time and energy and where we put our attention.

In any arena, in any place, in any thing, if something doesn’t add, take it away and see what happens.