Photographs by Peden + Munk

Few ingredients are as precisely calibrated as an egg. It's a gift from nature that comes prepackaged and premeasured, ready to impart both richness and loft to savory and sweet dishes. But somewhere along the way, this balance was disturbed with the introduction of the egg-white omelet. It's a flavorless and rubbery nutraceutical masquerading as a breakfast item. And it's something that otherwise enlightened eaters still order.

To do without the yolk is not only a culinary loss but a nutritional one as well: The yolk helps the body digest the white's proteins. (And we now know that fears of the yolk's cholesterol are largely overblown.) It's also a refusal to participate in the found poetry of the whole egg. A yolk and a white are like yin and yang, peanut butter and jelly: two halves that only reach perfection in the pairing. --Hugh Garvey

THE ARCHITECTURE OF AN EGG

One large egg weighs about 2 ounces, has 74 calories, and is made up of many interconnected parts. Here's a look inside.

Yolk

: The yolk delivers three-quarters of the egg's calories and nutrients and contains the proteins that create emulsions like aioli.

Chalazae

: A pair of twisted cords that anchor the yolk in the center of the egg.

Inner White

: The white is 90 percent water; the remainder is mainly protein. Thicker and firmer than the outer white, the inner white cushions the yolk and will appear cloudy when very fresh. That's a good sign when making souffles: Fresh whites make for more stable foams.

Outer White

: Picture the profile of a fried egg and you'll recognize the thin outer edge of the white, which cooks more quickly than the center. Older eggs have a higher proportion of this thin white.

Eggshell

: The permeable shell has up to 17,000 pores, which is how the egg loses moisture over time. It's also how it picks up refrigerator odors, so store your eggs in the carton they came in (or make like the French and store in a jar with truffles).