Six minutes for a large egg from the fridge into boiling water. That gives a fully set white and a properly runny yolk. Five minutes leaves the yolk liquid and the white only just holding together, which is what you want for dipping. Push to 6:45 and the yolk turns jammy.

Forty-five seconds, and a completely different egg. A soft boiled yolk at six minutes still runs when you cut it. A jammy yolk at 6:45 is set enough to hold its shape but stays custardy in the middle — the ramen-egg texture. Neither is more correct; they are for different jobs.

Boiling. At this end of the scale, thirty seconds is visible in the yolk, and a boiling-water start means cooking begins at a moment you can identify exactly. A cold-water start works, but the egg begins cooking somewhere on the way up to the boil, so the timing is less repeatable.

Cool it in ice water for a full minute first — a warm soft boiled egg has nothing holding it together. Then tap it all over rather than cracking it in one place, and peel from the wide end under cool running water. For anything under six minutes, skip peeling entirely: crack the top and eat it out of the shell with a spoon.

Almost always one of three things: the egg was extra large or jumbo and needed 30 to 60 seconds more, the water was at a simmer rather than a rolling boil, or you started it in cold water without adjusting. A simmer is the sneaky one — it looks close enough and is not.