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Post by liriodendron on Apr 5, 2007 7:52:39 GMT -5
Has anyone ever tried to dye brown eggs? Are the results acceptable or simply hideous? I generally buy eggs from the farmer down the street and her chickens lay only brown eggs. If need be, I'll make a trip to the grocery store for white ones, but heck, if brown ones will work, life would be much easier.
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Post by gailkate on Apr 5, 2007 8:25:35 GMT -5
I've never tried it - haven't dyed eggs in lo, these many decades - but I'm inclined to think brown won't work. Unless you want to go for the current "Tuscan palette," all dark and orangey with olive and mustardy gold. That could be trendy.
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Post by doctork on Apr 5, 2007 8:36:58 GMT -5
My husband does most of the grocery shopping lately, and he buys "organic" brown eggs. If we want Easter eggs, I go out and buy white eggs, assuming that the brown ones wouldn' take the color well.
I think gailkate is right about the Tuscan color palette results, but I'm not sure.
I saw Martha Stewart on TV this week, demonstrating the various ways of obtaining beautifully colored and patterned Easter eggs. Momentarily the thought passed my mind: "I should try that!" If I do, I'll get white eggs, as I am way too lazy to try her fancy techniques on brown eggs, and then discover they don't look good.
Disappointment, kind of like getting an ice cream cone, and the scoop of ice cream falls off on the ground...
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Post by slb2 on Apr 5, 2007 8:49:47 GMT -5
I went to the store specifically for white eggs, lirio. We do natural dyes, using red cabbage, tumeric, onion skins, etc. but not on brown eggs. If you'd prefer to use brown eggs, you might make a thin solution of school glue and water, then paint that on eggs and smooth torn bits of colored crepe paper over them. I did that with blown-out eggs and they've remained quite lovely.
Have you-know-who blow the eggs out for you, get rid of some of that hot air.
Disappointment, like rubbing one's tongue on a nice chocolate-brown ice cream only to discover prune flavor.
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Post by hartlikeawheel on Apr 5, 2007 11:09:49 GMT -5
One issue of Martha Stewart's magazine, "Living", had a picture of earth-toned eggs on the cover some years ago.
It may be worth a try, lirio. I'd google a homemade recipe for dyeing so you don't have to waste one from your kit if you are using one. The recipe involves water, a small amount of vinegar and food coloring.
If this works you may have some very subtle and lovely shades develop.
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Post by ozski on Apr 5, 2007 11:46:44 GMT -5
This past Monday I went to the Senior Village that Mom had been living at the past three years and saw a sight much like the following: I honestly thought dyeing chicks was no longer allowed. Think they were dipped in Kool-Aid?
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Post by edsfam on Apr 5, 2007 12:10:45 GMT -5
Hoppy Easter to all ...
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Post by hartlikeawheel on Apr 5, 2007 15:25:18 GMT -5
This thread is an inspiration.
One of my close friends died just before Easter and the thought of new life was a comfort to me.
No wonder the church moved the resurrection to the Spring! I can get into that. The miracle of new life is all about us now. Who could not feel cheer?
Geez, _E_, is that rabbit pushing away the stones? You are such a rascal!
"Argh" on the chicks, Dorothy, but better than the sparrow that Emily brought me today. When the Christian God put us in dominion over his creatures I don't think that's what He had in mind. Apparently it isn't harmful to the little fuzzballs. I hope. It's certainly an unneccesarily traumatic experience nonetheless.
They are so sweet - both the peeps (bite the head off first as Emily did) and the chicks.
While on the subject can anyone tell me what egg rolling is about? We don't do that on the prairie. Too flat I suppose.
Egg rolls. Yum.
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Post by liriodendron on Apr 5, 2007 20:29:04 GMT -5
I bought two dozen white eggs. However, I am going to try a few brown eggs, too, just to see the results.
As for Martha Stewart, I have a love/hate relationship with her. I once watched an episode of her show that dealt with Halloween decorations. She made a dragon out of about a dozen carved pumpkins with a string of Christmas lights snaking within them. Beautiful, but waaaaaaay out of my league! Not to mention the cost of a dozen fairly large pumpkins.
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Post by liriodendron on Apr 6, 2007 12:14:09 GMT -5
Have you-know-who blow the eggs out for you, get rid of some of that hot air. slb, you made me laugh.
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Post by liriodendron on Apr 6, 2007 12:16:18 GMT -5
Alrighty then, any ideas for egg yolks? My kids will only eat the white part (which, I realize, is much healthier). I just feel sorta guilty tossing all those yolks into the garbage.
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Post by slb2 on Apr 6, 2007 12:28:14 GMT -5
think of the yolk as nutrients for the Earth. Feed the planet, it's good for your health.
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Post by edsfam on Apr 6, 2007 12:36:33 GMT -5
Geez, _E_, is that rabbit pushing away the stones? You are such a rascal! My youngest son was the baker and decorator on the cake. He opined that rabbits on a cross would look "too yucky to eat" so he went with the Rolling of the Stone Version. He is risen Indeed ... and is hiding eggs and candy? _E_
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Post by Gracie on Apr 6, 2007 13:56:02 GMT -5
Alrighty then, any ideas for egg yolks? My kids will only eat the white part (which, I realize, is much healthier). I just feel sorta guilty tossing all those yolks into the garbage. Cholesterol is not a problem in our house...we all have reaaaaally low numbers, so I save them and add them to baked custard (and since I'm the only one who likes it, I enjoy it all the more because it's all mine, mine, MINE!) or homemade tapioca puddings. (Ditto. Neither Grizzy or the kid like it. But I love it.) I've also added them to my bread dough whenever I'm using the sourdough. And there's a way cool thing you can do if you're into decorating cookies....you can mix them with food coloring and a little water (keeping in mind the yellow, so don't use colors that yellow won't be a good base, if you know what I mean) and then you paint the UNbaked cookies with this. Has to be unbaked for safety. I've done this with Betsy and she thinks it's just too neat for words...painting cookies and then baking them. It's a nice change from icing and sugar and sprinkles. I usually do this with flower shaped cookies...brown eyed Susans turn out pretty! or Christmas trees. And Peg Bracken, of "The I Hate to Cook Book" fame, which I adore even though I love to cook, says to regard it as an evil blob of cholesterol and drop it down the drain, OR give it to the cat--it's good for their coats. We'll be dyeing eggs here tomorrow; I bought four dozen on my way home from work last night (and then dropped them when I got out of the van...stood there wondering if I could convince the kid that the bunny leaves Easter omelets but fortunately there wasn't too much breakage.) Last year we did them with Betsy for the first time and it was SO much fun. I'd never done them before, because my mom never wanted to deal with the mess and so she and Daddy always dyed all of ours. But I say bring on the mess, she's only little once and she's the only child I have. And Daddy and I will just eat a boatload of egg salad....or my invented-based-on-two-lines-from-a-favorite-book egg casserole. We don't mind. We do the Easter bunny bit but she is more than aware of the true meaning of Easter, and I don't want to mix the two in her mind, so, cute as your cake is, Ed, we'll pass! But I admire your talent in decorating! I can't do it at all.
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Post by Gracie on Apr 6, 2007 13:58:35 GMT -5
Oh and good grief, how could I forget...something my entire family WILL eat: homemade noodles.
If we don't want to eat them when I have a lot of yolks needing used, I make them, dry them and freeze them for the next time I'm stewing a chicken.
And I do have a sour cream cookie recipe that I created some years back when I was experimenting with angel food cakes and had a bazillion yolks...it uses five per batch of cookie dough.
And thus endeth the cooking chapter today.
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Post by gailkate on Apr 6, 2007 23:19:19 GMT -5
It hathn't ended till you shareth above-mentioned recipes.
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Post by slb2 on Apr 7, 2007 1:52:16 GMT -5
My entire family will drink water. Oh, nvm. Five of us drink Culligan water. One of us drinks tap water or carbonated water.
So we do drink water, but even then, it's different.
==sigh==
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Post by Gracie on Apr 7, 2007 9:43:20 GMT -5
Okay, GailKate, but I have to get ready for work now...so it'll be later today. Promise!
Time to cart the books, time to shelve the books, time to smile at the patrons....do I sound like the time to make the dougnuts man???
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Post by Trusty on Apr 7, 2007 21:30:10 GMT -5
Geesh. Does it take a GUY to think of these things?
Here's what ya do: Get the brown eggs, and tell everybody you dyed all of them brown this year, and they better not have a problem with that, and go watch TV.
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Post by slb2 on Apr 7, 2007 23:51:25 GMT -5
Trusty, I want to meet you.....
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Post by liriodendron on Apr 8, 2007 8:08:54 GMT -5
Here's the lowdown on dying brown eggs. The red, orange, and yellow looked pretty good, although I'm not sure a child would appreciate a basket full of them. The blue looked putrid. I suspect the green and purple would have looked equally as bad, however, the other two brown eggs developed cracks before they could be dyed.
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Post by gailkate on Apr 8, 2007 9:06:44 GMT -5
Our own star of "Ask Dr.Science"!! Thank you, lirio, for this well-executed experiment. Your lab report couldn't be clearer: though putrid doesn't have a precise scientific definition, we all recognize the concept.
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Post by Trusty on Apr 8, 2007 19:49:01 GMT -5
The red, orange, and yellow looked pretty good, although I'm not sure a child would appreciate a basket full of them. The blue looked putrid. I suspect the green and purple would have looked equally as bad So, brown eggs look best in autumn colors. Not the best for a springtime Easter! Someday, I'd like to meet me, too, but, to be honest about it, I'm afraid of the encounter.
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