More than any other room in our homes, the kitchen is a gathering place for strange gadgets. It's like the Island of Lost Toys for impulse Sur La Table buys. Our cupboards and drawers are filled with devices we didn’t know we needed until we owned them (and even then, oftentimes it's still not clear that we need them). Things like banana slicers, temperature-controlled butter dishes and this strange little contraption called the Goose.
The Goose, currently part of a Kickstarter campaign, touts itself as the easiest and fastest way to make a golden egg. For those who aren’t familiar, a golden egg is an egg that’s scrambled inside its shell. That’s right, it’s possible to mix the yolk and white without penetrating an egg’s hard exterior. The whole process is sort of magical, and the outcome: very delicious. But making one has always been a pain in the ass.
Google “how to make a golden egg” and you’ll likely get a step by step manual requiring you to cut nylon leggings and spin them back and forth to create a centrifugal effect. The Goose, designed by the team at Y Line Product Design in Chicago, uses this same spinning principle, but translates it to an easy to use, low-tech tool. “We wanted to make something that everyone could use,” says Geraint Krumpe, founder of Y Line.
The device is made from two flexible nylon cords that attach to a plastic shell. You put your egg inside this cradle then pull the strings like you would an old Victorian era toy, spinning the egg forwards and backwards. You’ll notice that this plastic egg cradle is placed perpendicular to the rotational axis, so when you pull the two strings apart, you get the ideal amount of force. “This is crucially important,” says Krumpe. “It allows for four point of contact inside the egg for the yolk to macerate and mix with the whites.”
According to the designers, the hand-powered centrifuge can be used for more than just golden eggs. A stretch goal for the Kickstarter project includes a rapid infuser, which lets you juice up spirits with super speed. “You can imagine a muscle shirt guy down in South Beach with two of these contraptions making drinks with both hands," Krumpe says.
Using the Goose is meant to be stupidly simple, but getting it to that point took a ton of iteration--and more than a few broken eggs. “I’ve probably broken more than 100 eggs during the design process,” Krumpe says. The final design is the eighth version, a significant upgrade from the initial prototype which used an old bouillon cube canister and shoestrings from a pair of soccer cleats.
The Goose looks like the type of unassuming gadget that could make millions on the Home Shopping Network, and it's already found quite a few fans on Kickstarter. Krumpe has already raised more than four times his original goal of $30,000. Golden eggs, it turns out, are something that have eluded a good many amateur gourmands. “I had no idea that people would be so excited,” Krumpe says. "One person even said it was a life-changing event."
