Beet Pickled Eggs inspired by Amy Thielen’s “The Midwest Table”
When you co-own Locally Laid Egg Company, people turn to you with high expectations.
(Ok, I really wanted to put egg’spectations there but I refrained, mostly. kinda.)
Fortunately, I know people. Foodie People who know how to make things. My friend, Sue Sailer of Perham, gifted my family some delicious pickled beets and suggested that they can be used to dye deviled eggs.
I was all ears.
As our flocks lay brown eggs ( and we like to use natural items to color them). the holidays have been more muted and sweet than WACKY & VIBRANT. But here was a chance to have a little dazzle!
Sue got the idea from the book “The New Midwestern Table” by Amy Theilen. If you’ve heard that name before you likely know of her runaway best-seller “Give a Girl a Knife.”
Microwave Egg Cooker
Inside view — water goes under the rack that holds the eggs
Now, I’m lucky enough to be using really fresh eggs (like laid that morning fresh), but I’ve run into some trouble with peeling hard-boiled eggs in the past.
That’s because in freshly laid eggs, the egg white (albumen) sticks to the membrane that lines the shell. As it ages, it naturally pulls away from the membrane and becomes easier to peel.
(It has to do with how the albumen stores carbon dioxide which releases over time through the shell pores. As the CO leaves the egg white, it changes the acidity/PH making it less attracted to that shell membrane.)
But a workaround I’ve found has been to steam my fresh eggs. You can use one of those metal flowery looking steamers in a saucepan (directions here ) or you can use a microwave steamer, like this cute one shaped like an egg. (When you own an egg company, people give you things.)
Once hard-boiled, I put them in cold water and let them sit. When cool, I peeled them easily – like really easily. It was like buttah.
Clearly, my friend Sue is good at food
Then, I placed the smooth shell-free eggs in a bowl with picked-beet juice for about 30 minutes — while I ate the beets, of course. (Theilen suggests soaking overnight, but I truly wasn’t that organized.)
Once the soaked eggs had mostly dried, I sliced them in half using a serrated knife — it gives a nice wave to the egg white. From there, I harvested the yellows and mixed a traditional deviled egg filling. Thielen’s sounds better but spicier and I wanted my family to eat these. Farmer Jason has a Norwegian palate and I like him enough to work around it.
The finished product was as bright and beautiful as I imagine spring is in places that aren’t the Northland.
Abbie approved