You're the Easter bunny when you smile

In their natural state

Now that we have a steady supply of eggs coming in and March is moving right along, I’ve had egg dyeing on my mind. I’ve been really excited about trying out natural egg dyeing for a few years now and decided that this was the perfect opportunity to do some testing. For this attempt, I wanted to use items that I already had on hand, so that gave me four different materials - beets, turmeric, yellow onion skins, and red onion skins (I had the onion skins around from onions we’d formerly peeled,  but if you needed to peel fresh onions,  you could always caramelize them and freeze them for later). First up is making the dye bath. I would suggest using at least a quart of water, even if you’re only dyeing an egg or two in that color, as some water will evaporate and you will need enough to fully cover your egg(s). Bring water, salt*, vinegar, and dyeing agent to a boil in a large pot. Lower to a simmer and cook for 30 minutes, or until it reaches your desired color (you can test this by spooning some into a white bowl). Below are the "recipes" I used.

desired color	dyeing material	amount of material per quart of water	added to the mix
yellow	turmeric	6 tablespoons	2 tablespoons vinegar, 2 tablespoons salt
pink	beets	4 cups	2 tablespoons vinegar, 2 tablespoons salt
brown	onion skins	4 cups (about 12 onions worth)	2 tablespoons vinegar, 2 tablespoons salt
maroon	red onion skins	4 cups	2 tablespoons vinegar, 2 tablespoons salt

*I'm not entirely sold on the salt - it didn't seem to have much impact on the depth of the color and I wonder if it contributed to some of the thinning that happened to my egg shells that soaked overnight.

After I made the dyes, I tried a couple of different techniques. I put half of the eggs into the dye baths raw and simmered them for 15 minutes, then poured the dye into a jar and soaked the eggs in the dye in the fridge overnight. The other half, I hardboiled, cooled, and then put into the cooled dye bath and into the fridge overnight.

Here’s what they looked like when I’d finished:

The eggs that went straight into the fridge were very subtle. The eggs cooked in the dye were more vibrant (except for the turmeric, not sure what happened there), but not as exciting as I'd hoped. Overall, I think that they are interesting and pretty in their way, but I’m not totally satisfied. There are a few things I’d do differently next time. I would make the dyes stronger (probably both increase the ratio of dyeing matter to water and cook the dye a little longer). I would dye them as we did when we were kids, periodically turning one egg at a time in a bowl, so that the kiddo can help and so I can get the color more even (probably have to leave them to soak for a bit and come back - wonder how long hardboiled eggs can sit out?). I do also acknowledge that starting out with brown eggs means that the colors won't look as vibrant as they would on white eggs. Still, I'm happy with my first attempt, and he really liked the hunt!

This face cracks me up

Here are some of the resources that I used, as well as some that I found after the fact:

• Two Men and a  Little Farm
• theKitchn
• serious eats
• Martha Stewart
• Design*Sponge
• radmegan