Marbeled Devil Eggs

I had initially conceptualized this dish as an appetizer idea for a 4th of July party. I intended to marble dye my eggs a bright red and blue in keeping with the Red, White and Blue food theme for the holiday. Unfortunately, I only had gel food coloring at hand and thought I could make do with it and so I had to dilute my colors a litle, which as it turns out, made my eggs a light blue and pinkish shade instead. Also, the yellow yolks mixed with the food color turned a more teal and orange-ish color rather than red and blue again. Since I wasn’t too happy with my results, I was hesitent to post this recipe idea. Luckily for you… I ended up procrastinating all last week and was too busy enjoying the warmer weather up here in the NW rather than working on recipes. So I’m going to go ahead and post it anyway…after all I do think they turned out cute… don’t you think?

Now, I must warn you that this post is more like a recipe idea rather than an precise recipe. I didn’t measure out anything (I don’t usually tend to when I cook, unless I’m doing a recipe for this blog) and you can play around with the colors and flavors you like, depending on the occassion. I still think it would make a great 4th of July recipe and I’ll probably make them again, using liquid food dyes rather than the gel type ones. The way this batch turned out, I would defintely serve them for a baby shower or kids birthday party cos they’re so pretty and different from your usual deviled eggs. They tasted just great and my husband and daughter gobbled them up faster than it took to make them! Anyway, here’s how you can make them…

For another cool twist on Deviled Eggs check out this recipe – Scotch Deviled Eggs

Marbeled Deviled Eggs

Ingredients:
Eggs
Food Coloring (I used red and blue)
Mayonnaise
Dijon mustard
Ranch
Garlic powder
Salt & Pepper
Paprika

Method:
– Start by hard boiling eggs (how ever many you want). For perfect hard boiled eggs- simply place the eggs in a sauce pan filled with cold water, making sure to cover the eggs completely. Bring it to a boil, uncovered. Once the water comes to a boil, cover the pan, take it off the heat and leave for 17 mins. Remove and rinse the eggs under cold water. Perfect hard boiled eggs…EVERYTIME!
– If you’re using liquid food color, you can use zip lock bags and pour a few drops of color in it along with a dash of water (or no water at all), but if you’re using gel colors like the ones I had you’ll need to use 2 bowls. Squirt some little color in the bottom of a bowl. Add enough water to submerge the eggs in and stir so that all the gel color is dissolved. (Using liquid colors with very little or no water at all in a ziplock bag will give you brighter colors.)
– Lightly tap the eggs against a hard surface till cracks appear all over. Be gentle as you want the shells cracked but still intact and not peeling off.
– Let the cracked eggs sit in the colored water submerged, or zip lock bag with color in it for at least half an hour. If you’re using the zip lock bag method, make sure to roll the eggs in the bag to make sure they are well coated in the color.
– Then take the eggs out of the colored water and rinse them under some fresh water to get the excess color off. Then peel the eggs. Pretty aren’t they?
– Cut the eggs in half length-wise. (my eggs needed to have been boiled a tad longer…I forgot to time them and just winged it. But if you do exactly 17 minutes like I said above, they should be perfect!)
– Scoop out the yolks into a bowl with a spoon.
– Add a dollop of mayo, a squirt of dijon mustard and ranch, then season with salt, pepper and garlic powder. (Make the filling the way you like). Mash and stir the mix well until it’s smooth and creamy. Go ahead, give it a taste to check the seasoning.
– Divide the yolk mixture into 2 bowls.
– Add a dash of different colorings (optional) to each bowl and stir it well.
– Pipe the yolk mixture into the marbeled eggs. I put the red mix in the blue marbeled eggs and the blue mix (which turned kinda green cos the yolks are yellow) into the Red eggs. Garnish with a sprinkle of paprika and serve.