Fried eggs are a great option for a tasty meal if you aren’t the best of cooks because they’re quick and relatively easy to make. It’s basically a case of cracking open the shell, throwing the egg in a pan and heating it, so there’s not too much that can go wrong other than overcooking it.

If you get your timings right you should have a delicious fried egg that’s ready to eat in around five minutes, but if you want to enhance the flavour - with very little effort - then there’s one ingredient you should add to the mix. Normally, when cooking fried eggs, most recipes say to use oil in the pan. This helps stop the egg from sticking and is considered a healthy choice, but most oils - like sunflower, olive or vegetable - have a pretty neutral flavour, so you don’t really get anything extra out of it in terms of the overall taste of your eggs.

As such, cooking experts recommend adding butter to the pan instead as this adds a much richer flavour and will give your eggs a crispier texture.

Butter has a higher fat content than oil and this gives fried eggs a more flavourful and creamier taste, and it allows for more browning and caramelisation of the whites to creates a tasty crispy edge.

The Happy Egg Co. explains: “The best thing about frying eggs in butter is the taste. Because butter is higher in fat than oil, your eggs will naturally take on that rich butter flavour as they crisp in the pan. It’s similar to the way some chefs add a pad of butter to their scrambled eggs as they cook. 

“There aren’t many health benefits to frying eggs in butter, but you’re not adding butter to the pan for the health benefits, you’re adding it for the extra flavour!”

Cooking experts also recommend basting your fried egg with melted butter while it’s in the pan as this helps it to distribute heat for a more even cook and it helps to create the deliciously crispy edges on the egg whites.

The Kitchn adds: “Sizzle a generous curl of butter - about a tablespoon per egg - in the pan until it goes foamy, then crack in the eggs. The whites will quickly start to set, and when they do, tilt the pan just far enough so that butter puddles at the edge. 

“Use your spoon to dribble butter over the eggs continuously, until the whites are just set. By this time, the butter will have browned and started to give off that toasty, nutty smell, also known as the best smell in the world.”