Although there are many other ways to give Easter eggs a festive look, I color mine every year with herbs and flowers from the garden in an onion peel broth - and they look different every time. ;-)
The whole preparation process to dye the Easter eggs naturally with onion peels sounds more complicated than it actually is - we promise - and the effect is simply fantastic!
The flowers, herbs and leaves give the dyed Easter eggs a wonderful effect and the brown tone is also really nice to look at.
This is what you need:
12 white or brown eggs - you can also use more eggs, but then I would use 2 cooking pots or plan three or 4 cooking sessions
1 bag of onion peels - you can buy them or collect them yourself in advance
1 old thin nylon tights
Kitchen string & scissors
various herbs, flowers, grasses and leaves from the garden
This is how you do it:
Fill one or two cooking pots - depending on the amount of eggs - with water and add the onion skins
Boil the water with the onion peels
The cooking pot should be properly filled with onion skins so that the eggs lie “comfortably” in the bed of onion shells while cooking. The more onion peels, the more intense the color of the eggs will be in the end.
Cut the tights into 8-10 cm long sections - you can also use the “feet”.
Prepare 24 pieces of kitchen twine, each approx. 12 cm long
Tie the bottom opening of each section of tights with kitchen string - make sure you tie as close to the end of the tights as possible
And now comes the tricky part: take an egg, put it e.g. For example, if you place a flower and a leaf on it, hold it firmly while you place the egg in the prepared piece of tights and place it tightly over the flower and leaf
You can decorate the back with another leaf or flower, but be careful that the things you have already put on don't slip
I usually only use two plants per egg and make sure that one of them is a little longer and extends around the egg if possible. This is how I decorated a large part of the egg surface.
It is important that you tie the tights really tightly over the motifs so that they do not slip while cooking and achieve the desired effect
When you have prepared all the eggs and the water is slightly boiling, you can carefully place the first 6 eggs wrapped in tights in the pot between the onion skins using a wooden spoon
The eggs must be deep in the water and between the onion skins so that they survive the cooking time intact and have maximum color.
You can use 6 eggs in the first cooking step; if you have two cooking pots, you can also store the remaining eggs there
Once the eggs are in the slightly boiling onion stock, you can let them simmer for about 12-15 minutes
Then take the wooden spoon and carefully look for the eggs between the onion skins and then lift them out one by one
Hold the egg directly under cold water and carefully cut away the tights
And now you see your surprise eggs, because the motifs or coloring are not always exactly how you imagined them - but they are always very pretty
Now put the remaining uncooked eggs in the onion stock and proceed in exactly the same way
You can “polish” the finished eggs with a little household paper and olive oil to give them a nice, matt shine
Your self-colored eggs look beautiful in an Easter basket on the Easter table - Happy Easter!
You can control the end result somewhat with your motifs, but you won't see whether the effect is exactly as you imagined until you hold the "unwrapped" egg in your hands. To reassure you: The eggs ALWAYS look beautiful, even if not the way you imagined. ;-)
