Question

People add sodium chloride to water while boiling eggs. This is to______________.

Answer 1

Sodium chloride is added to water while boiling eggs:

• NaCl or salt is added to the water when boiling eggs as the addition of salt or other non-volatile solid help in reducing the vapour pressure of the liquid.
• Which in turn increases, the boiling point i.e the temperature at which the vapour pressure equals the atmospheric pressure.
• Hence, this helps the water to attain a temperature higher than $100°\mathrm{C}$ before starting to boil.
• This phenomenon helps cook and hard boil the egg quicker as the addition of salt has increased the boiling point of water.
• Also, the added salt to the water prevents an egg from cracking during cooking.

Therefore, people add sodium chloride to water while boiling eggs to increase the temperature of the water.