'Don't do it': Viral poached egg hack leaves woman with severe burns on her face

A mum has warned others against trying to poach an egg in the microwave after it backfired in her face. Photo / TikTok

We all love a cooking hack to help us save time in the kitchen - but it turns out some of these hacks should come with a warning.

One woman's microwave egg-poaching trick backfired and blew up in her face, leaving her with severe burns, reports The Mirror UK.

Chantelle Conway had put boiling water in a cup with a raw egg before microwaving it for 10 seconds, a method she'd been using for two years - but last week it all went wrong.

Conway, 25, revealed she was left screaming in pain, convinced she'd "burnt her face off" when she removed the egg from the boiling water with a cold spoon. The clash of temperatures caused the water to burst out of the cup straight into her face.

As a result, she suffered excruciating burns to her face - and she's been sharing videos of her face on TikTok to warn others against the viral hack.

"I've always done poached eggs that way because it was just a quicker and easier way of doing them," she said.

"When I took it out of the microwave I put a metal spoon in to turn the egg and check if it was cooked but as soon as the spoon touched the water it shot out. It wasn't the egg that blew up, that landed on my kitchen side.

"The water went everywhere - all over my face and neck and I'm sure it even hit the ceiling because there's a mark above where I was standing.

"It was the worst pain I've ever experienced in my life and I've had two natural childbirths - it felt like someone had a blowtorch on my face constantly and I was convinced my whole face had burnt off.

"I think I probably would've died from the pain if I hadn't acted so fast pouring cold water on myself because it was that bad, I couldn't handle it."

She was at home with her 18-month-old baby at the time and had to wait nearly an hour before her partner could take her to hospital. Staff told her she was lucky not to have suffered worse burns as she'd quickly doused her face in cold water.

Chantelle is now hoping the burst blisters on her face won't scar.

"I'm coming to the end of it now and my burnt skin is shedding off like a snake. I'm not in much pain now but it's very itchy and the inside of my nose and lips are still very raw."

She's now been put off eggs for life.

I get flashbacks and it's put me off cooking. I'll never have an egg again because I'm so traumatised - I used to love eggs.

"I do take full responsibility for what happened, it was silly of me to do it and I just want more people to know what can happen so it doesn't happen to anyone else.

"I've seen loads of videos of people doing it on TikTok and I just want to show people what can happen to hopefully stop them doing it."