I recall my Mother always having one of those little box kits miraculously appear to ‘naturally’ dye eggs for Easter. Such excitement & mystery that little box held for me. Still today, it is a harbinger of Easter and I can’t picture the holiday without seeing racks of them in all the stores. They are only dried forms of commercial food coloring, but they sure held a magic for me, and still do. Even though, I now know about toxins of artificial food coloring and dyes, the appeal of the box is hard to resist- as is many of our traditional products.
It really isn’t easy being non toxic sometimes because all these wonder innovations hold special memories created to save us time; and time seems now more important than anything to everyone. I began to wonder how eggs were dyed before the magic box came to be. Turns out all you need are fruits and vegetable (save all your scraps!) and….of course the time.
So below I list what you need to have a wonderful, egg dying evening with no thought to all the must dos and hurry-ups beyond just how blue your egg is turning. Send me pictures of your ‘onion’ egg creations and I will post them for all the box people to envy!
What to use for natural Easter egg dyes:
Water-vinegar-vegetable oil
Blue….purple or red cabbage & blueberries (makes blue on white eggs, green on brown)
Green….spinach
Orange…carrots, paprika, yellow onion skins (makes rusty red on brown eggs)
Red…red onion skins, cherries, beets
Violet….red wine, hibiscus tea, red onion skins
Pink….shredded beets (makes maroon on brown eggs)
Yellow….turmeric-2 tbl. ground
Lavender…1 bag Red Zinger tea
How to make the natural dye:
Add 1 cup of the item/items to 4 cups of water and bring to a boil; then simmer covered for up to 30 minutes. Like the box dye, it is ready when its darker than the color you want. You can always check the color by dripping some on a white dish.
Let your dye cool to the touch, fine strain it then add 1 Tbl. vinegar. Arrange room temperature, cooked eggs in a deep dish or bowl and completely cover them with the dye. Put the bowl in the refrigerator and chill until you like the color. Dry them oh so careful and rub on some oil to polish with paper towel.
Have fun! Lynn & Jazzy