My fondest memories of holidays were spent at my grandmother’s house, packed with relatives and friends, and tables piled high with Latvian sauerkraut, kielbasa, honey ham, savory meat-filled pancakes and Jell-o. Thinking back, these were probably the best holidays because they meant toys and candy were soon to come my way. I’ll believe in anything imaginary as long as I get my basket of jelly beans!
Easter always involved a production, which is why I loved it so much. My family arrived at my grandmother’s house early in the morning. My grandmother, cooking since 6 AM, would be studding her massive loaves of saffron raisin bread before they went in the oven. A few dozen eggs boiled away in onion peels on the stove and set up on the kitchen table were the “children’s eggs,” store-bought kits for us to dye eggs. (Thinking back, I now realize these eggs were the “throw aways” for us kids to hide, break and maybe find, while my grandmother’s natural eggs were the table’s centerpiece and center of conversation.)
With eggs dyed and breakfast consumed, the adults hid eggs. We used to stay in-house, but the year after the still discussed “disappearing egg” was found rotting behind a book a few months after Easter, all egg activities were moved outside. My brothers and I followed the adults, baskets in hand, destroying the house then digging up the garden, searching for eggs. We were rewarded with an early dinner and a basket of sugar.
But always, through the years, my grandmother’s eggs stuck with me. She dyed eggs a vibrant marbled amber with a handful of onion peels and some vinegar. I worked with this, and a few other colors for an upcoming article. Above are my results.
The onion peel eggs are at top, the lighter marbled egg was wrapped in peels, secured with rubber bands and boiled for 15 minutes. The darker one was boiled loose in the peels for about 25 minutes. Top right, the striped one was wrapped in rubber bands and dyed in beet juice (who knew that beet juice, which turns everything magenta would turn eggs a dull grey-green). The speckled egg next to that was boiled for 15 min in spinach then left overnight to soak. Blueberries are the indigo eggs (1 cup frozen blueberries, 2 cups water, 1 tsp vinegar, boiled 15 min). The one in the middle had star-shaped stickers adhered before dying (just make sure the egg is totally dry before removing stickers or they will run– I lost a dinosaur with running dye!). At left, my favorite surprise, are turmeric dyed eggs. These were left about 15 minutes in 3 cups water, 1 teaspoon vinegar and 1 tablespoon turmeric. They are true golden eggs. I dripped blue crayon on the one at left to produce the polka dots.
I thought of mixing blueberries with turmeric to get a vibrant green. I bet it would be fantastic. And I’ve heard red cabbage, boiled 15 minutes with 1 teaspoon vinegar and left overnight produces a fabulous teal. I heard soaking in pomegranate juice produces red, but mine turned out a putrid brown.
Natural egg dyes turn Easter into a fun guessing game and a fabulous science experiment. They are also safer than store-bought dye kits which, though they are “food safe,” processed food dyes are mostly coal tar-based (and many of them are banned in the EU).
So have fun, use your imagination with regular household items, have a wonderful holiday, and enjoy your egg salad! I’ll link to my story once it is out.