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The popularity of pickled eggs, beets may have peaked, but age-old recipes endure in area
By Lisa Abraham
Beacon Journal food writer
Published on Wednesday, Mar 19, 2008
Well, if the photo wasn't enough to give it away, the answer is pickled eggs.
As Easter approaches, the vinegar and sugar will be boiling as many home cooks make this traditional food — eggs purple from beet juice or yellow from mustard.
Most people have a strong reaction to pickled eggs — they love them or hate them.
For Jeanette Raper of Canal Fulton, hard-boiled eggs, yellow from mustard brine, is a family favorite at Easter. She also makes the red beet variety from time to time with a recipe a friend gave her more than 20 years ago.
''A lot of people don't do the old type of things anymore. It's going by the wayside I think,'' Raper said.
However, she admits her own concerns about eating healthy have taken a lot of foods, like eggs, out of her regular diet. ''I'm into cooking lean, too,'' she said.
But the family Easter gathering at her sister's home is the one time when pickled eggs are always on the table, said Raper, who is in charge of bringing them.
Raper thinks it's the yellow or purple color that turns some people off. The colors, however, are what make them a tradition with many cooks for Easter — and they provide a way to use up all of the leftover dyed hard-boiled eggs.
Pickled eggs can be traced back to a time when there was no refrigeration, and preserving foods with salt or brine was a must.
In England, pickled eggs and pickled onions were workingman's food, and gained popularity in pubs where the eggs were on hand to accompany a pint of ale.
Even in the U.S., a jar of pickled eggs was a fixture on the counter of many neighborhood taverns.
But pickled eggs have fallen off our culinary radar, and for some, reduced to the butt of jokes like those on The Simpsons, where the jar at Moe's tavern is a steady source of comedy.
Even the Better Homes and Gardens New Cook Book, the red-and-white plaid standard for home cooks, has dropped recipes for pickled beets and pickled eggs from its pages.
Pickled eggs were first to go, followed by pickled beets in the most recent 2002 edition, said Jan Miller, a group editor for Meredith Special Interest Media, which publishes the cookbook.
Miller said deciding what recipes are no longer relevant is delicate work for the editors. The book has kept its chapter on canning and devotes space to recipes for dill pickles and bread-and-butter pickles, but the editors felt that people aren't making and eating pickled eggs and beets like they once did.
Unlike other cases, there was no reader reaction when the recipes were dropped. ''There really was not a pickled egg uproar,'' she said.
However, Miller said Better Homes and Gardens recently published recipes for pickled jalapeno eggs for tailgate parties and pickled beets in its magazine.
''Sometimes it's easier to use those recipes in publications that don't have quite the long shelf life the book does,'' she said.
Ohio's Amish community in Wayne, Holmes and Tuscarawas counties is one of the reasons the dish has remained popular here. Visitors often eat them at Amish-run restaurants and look for ways to recreate them at home.
Pickled eggs are a staple of Pennsylvania Dutch and Amish cooking for the obvious reason: preservation.
Dutchman Hospitality Group in Walnut Creek operates Der Dutchman Restaurant & Bakery in Walnut Creek, Plain City and Waynesville, and Dutch Valley Restaurant & Bakery in Sugarcreek, and employs many Amish and Mennonite cooks in its kitchens.
Vicki VanNatta, marketing coordinator for Dutchman Hospitality, said traditional Amish don't use electricity and often have limited refrigeration. ''Pickled eggs came to be because it was a way of preserving them. They would mostly do red beet eggs and the vinegar mustard eggs,'' she said.
''Part of their life was to preserve things any way they could. They'd have these huge gardens and hen houses and chicken houses and their own eggs. And it was a way of preserving eggs when you couldn't use them all and you couldn't refrigerate them all or keep them all cold.''
Below are a variety of pickled egg recipes, including Der Dutchman's recipe for red beet eggs, and Raper's recipe for mustard pickled eggs.
RED BEET EGGS
1 quart red beets
2 cups sugar
3 cups vinegar
3 cups water
2 dozen hard-boiled eggs, peeled
Mix sugar, water, and vinegar. Add beets and eggs and allow to sit, overnight or several days.
— Der Dutchman of Walnut Creek, Amish Kitchen Cooking
PICKLED BEETS
1/3 cup vinegar
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup water
1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp. ground cloves
2 cups sliced, cooked beets or 1 15-oz. can sliced beets, drained
In a medium saucepan, combine the vinegar, sugar, water, cinnamon and cloves, and bring to a boil, stirring occasionally. Add the beets. Return to boiling; reduce heat, cover and simmer for 5 minutes. Cool.
Chill in liquid at least 8 hours. Drain before serving.
Can be covered and stored in liquid in the refrigerator up to one month.
Makes 8 servings.
Note: Six hard-boiled eggs can be added to one recipe of these pickled beets to make pickled eggs.
—Better Homes and Gardens New Cookbook, 1989 edition
BRITISH PUB PICKLED EGGS
12 hard-boiled eggs
4 cups malt vinegar
1 finely chopped chili pepper
10 black peppercorns
10 whole cloves
3 cinnamon sticks
2 tsp. allspice
Peel the hard-boiled eggs, allow them to cool and place them in a large clean jar.
Heat the vinegar and the spices in a saucepan until the liquid begins to boil. Reduce the heat and simmer for 10 minutes.
Remove from the heat and allow to cool to about room temperature.
Strain the liquid and pour over the eggs, covering them completely.
Seal the jar tightly with the lid and store in a cool, dark place for a minimum of two weeks before consuming.
Makes 12 servings.
— http://www.helpwithcooking.com
PICKLED EGGS WITH GINGER
16 hard-boiled eggs, cooled
1 quart vinegar, malt or cider
1 tbsp. ginger
1 tbsp. black pepper
1 tbsp. allspice
While the eggs are cooling, prepare the pickling liquid.
Place all ingredients into a medium sized saucepan, stir together and heat to boiling.
Once the liquid reaches boiling point, reduce the heat and let simmer 10 minutes.
Remove from the heat and cool to room temperature.
Place the peeled hard-boiled eggs into a very clean large jar.
Once the pickling solution has cooled, pour it over the eggs in the jar and seal the jar tightly with the lid.
Store the jar in a cool and dark cupboard for at least a month. The eggs will be ready to eat after this time.
Makes 16 servings.
— http://www.helpwithcooking.com
PICKLED EGGS
1 cup white vinegar
1/2 cup water, or beet or beetroot juice
1 tbsp. mixed pickling spices
1 tsp. pepper or 24 peppercorns
1/2 tsp. salt
1 clove garlic
6 hard-boiled eggs, shelled
In a saucepan combine vinegar, water or beet juice, spices, peppercorns, salt and garlic. Bring to a boil and simmer for 10 minutes.
Place hard-boiled eggs in a bowl or jar and cover with the spiced vinegar. Cover bowl or jar and refrigerate for 24 hours before serving. Eggs may be kept in refrigerator for a week to 10 days.
To serve, cut into wedges and arrange on serving plate.
Makes 6 servings.
—The Complete Book of Egg Cookery, Ann Seranne
PICKLED EGGS WITH MUSTARD
2 cups white vinegar
2 tbsp. mild mustard
1/2 cup water
1 cup sugar
1 tbsp. salt
1 tbsp. celery seed
1 tbsp. mustard seed
6 whole cloves
12 shelled, hard-boiled eggs
2 sliced onions
Add vinegar to mustard in saucepan. Mix in all ingredients except eggs and onions and simmer 10 minutes. Cool. Pour over eggs and onions. Cover and refrigerate overnight.
Makes 12 servings.
—Jeanette Raper, Canal Fulton
Hard-boiled egg tips:
Coloring a few eggs for Easter? Here's how the American Egg Board recommends hard-boiling eggs.
Place eggs in a single layer in a saucepan. Add enough cold water to come at least one inch above eggs. Cover and quickly bring just to boiling. Turn off heat. If necessary, remove pan from burner to prevent further boiling.
Let eggs stand, covered, in the hot water about 15 minutes for large eggs, 12 minutes for medium, 18 minutes for extra large. Immediately, run cold water over eggs or place them in ice water until completely cooled.
Remember, don't leave hard-boiled eggs sitting out longer than two hours. When eggs are boiled, the protective coating on the egg is washed away, making it easier for bacteria to enter the egg through its porous shell. Put hard-boiled eggs in the refrigerator within two hours of cooking and eat them within a week.
Lisa A. Abraham can be reached at 330-996-3737 or labraham@thebeaconjournal.com.
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