If you’ve read my last post you’ll know all about my disappointing attempt at dying my first batch of boiled eggs. Determined to come up with something pretty and Easter like and even just a little bit similar to some of those glorious pictures on Pinterest, I had another go. I shelved the gel dyes, which turned out to be useless for this type of thing and turned instead to Mother Nature. Now the results were not as vivid as I’d imagined but, after my last disaster, they turned out better than I had dared to hope for!

I really love these subtle tones, *(makes mental note for future crochet projects)* and the fact that you can make this soft blue out of a red cabbage was a complete revelation to me. (I would have previously thought they might come out red, well, you can see the logic there).

Along with red cabbage I made a batch of dye with onion skins and a batch with blueberries, (somebody had eaten all the beetroot before I could get to it, I’ll have to try that another time).

Those soft hues are so pretty and I even got one to come out with a leaf pattern by binding some garden foliage, plucked from a weedy crack in the paving, to the egg with some stretchy mesh before I popped it in the dye bath. They remind me of Chesil Beach, and a fabulous sunny weekend away last year, always and forever one of my favorite places to visit. The colours are uncannily similar to those found in the acres of pebbles that make up mile after mile of beautiful sea smoothed beach.

Ah yes, a reminder for sure of brighter days to come!

So all this experimentation, successful and otherwise, produced a large surfeit of boiled eggs. As only edible ingredients were used to dye the eggs they’re definitely safe to eat so with photos taken and notes made, ready to replicate the results closer to Easter, I decided to crack them open and make us all a nice lunch. I was delighted to find that the colour had permeated beneath the shells. This was going to make one very colourful egg and potato salad, especially as I had a bag of fancy new potatoes which were a mix of purple, pink and white.

Yes, I’m photographing potatoes now, but in my defense I’ve never seen a purple potato before so this is quite an occasion!

A bit of chopping, boiling, shelling, seasoning and mixing later and lunch is prepared.

Garnished with my fancy pants stenciled egg, I think it looks fit for a king! And the boys obviously agreed because it didn’t last five minutes and was declared the best egg and potato salad known to humanity. Those rich and creamy goose eggs can take a lot of the glory for that. I’ll definitely be buying them again. And purple potatoes too, if I can find them. Not that they tasted much different than the normal kind but they are PURPLE! – ’nuff said!

Now I just have the eggshells to show for all my efforts…

…and three happy, and replete teenage boys. What a lovely lunch to celebrate the first Monday of the holidays!

Here’s the recipe if anyone should care to know what went in there (and so I don’t forget either).

(Serves 4 as a light lunch)
6 hard boiled goose eggs (natural dye shenanigans optional)
A dozen fancy (or plain) new potatoes – also boiled.
Half a red onion very finely chopped.
A handful of parsley
Half a handful of chives
2 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil
Squeeze of half a lemon
Salt and freshly ground black pepper.

Gently toss all the ingredients together and enjoy. Add in a piece of fruit for afters and that’s my kind of easy, peasy, (and literally, lemon squeezy), sitting around the table together, family lunch. Ah, I love the holidays!

So that’s the boys fed and watered and duly returned to their respective pursuits. Time to crochet some more sock yarn eggs for the Easter table.

Then, I’ll be finishing up a new bunny doll design (take a sneak peak below)…

…and maybe doing a few more rows of Mexican blanket. As usual, I’m spoilt for choice with fabulous and fun crochet projects. There’s definitely more than one happy bunny around here!