How long to boil duck, quail and goose eggs
A quail egg weighs about 11 g; a goose egg about 150 g, more than ten times as much. They cook by the same physics as a hen's egg, heat travelling from the boiling water through the white into the yolk, but the time it takes grows quickly with size.
Boiling times by egg
For eggs straight from the fridge, lowered into water at a full boil at sea level, then moved into an ice bath for the time in the last column. A medium hen's egg is shown for comparison.
| Egg | Typical weight | Runny | Jammy | Fudgy | Hard-boiled | Then in ice |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Quail | 11 g | 2:10 | 2:28 | 2:51 | 3:52 | 1:17 |
| Duck | 75 g | 7:33 | 8:34 | 9:56 | 13:25 | 4:21 |
| Goose | 150 g | 11:55 | 13:31 | 15:39 | 21:08 | 6:49 |
| Hen (medium) | 58 g | 6:23 | 7:15 | 8:24 | 11:20 |
Why bigger eggs take so much longer
Heat has to travel to the centre of the yolk, and the time that takes grows with the square of the distance. A goose egg is about 14 times heavier than a quail egg but only about 2.4 times wider, so a hard-boiled goose egg needs 21:08 against 3:52 for a quail egg.
Tips for each egg
- Quail eggs: the times are short, so have the ice bath ready before they go in. To peel, roll them gently on the counter to crack the whole shell, then peel under water.
- Duck eggs: they have a thicker shell and a larger yolk for their size, and their white turns rubbery when overcooked. A jammy duck egg (8:34) is a treat on toast. Duck eggs fit the calculator: enter the weight in Chef mode.
- Goose eggs: one egg feeds two or three people. Lower it in very gently, as a cold egg this size cracks easily in boiling water.
How accurate are these times?
The model scales a hen's egg to each weight. Real duck and goose eggs have relatively larger yolks and thicker shells, and quail eggs are rounder, so treat the times as a precise starting point: if your result is slightly off, adjust by 15 seconds for quail eggs or up to a minute for goose eggs, and keep the rest the same next time.
Open the calculator for hen's and duck eggs, with a timer for the boil and the ice bath.