grace grits and gardening

ramblings from an arkansas farm girl

the Easter BAT

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Way before parents spent too much time trying to create magical memories for their children, my Momma (the BAT) made holidays special by just being herself and keeping life simple. Halloween involved homemade costumes, birthdays included handmade invitations, and 4th of July meant driving over the tracks to buy Roman candles we set off across the cotton field. Christmas was pure-dee-lightful from the moment the Sears Wish Book arrived in the mailbox to the dreaded morning we returned to school in January.

Easter Eggs

via morgueFile

And Easter? Easter was fun too. There was the all important Brinkley Chapel part with Brother Brown’s resurrection sermon, and although Daddy never once attended Easter service with us, he seemed to be in an okay mood (except the Easter Sunday our house was robbed but that’s a different story).

During the week leading up to Good Friday, our house smelled of Easter—white vinegar and PAAS dye. Easter egg dyeing was an important part of our tradition.

But my first spring semester in college, for whatever reason, I wasn’t planning to drive home to Arkansas for Easter break. Not enough time? I don’t recall. But I do remember thinking what about Easter eggs? We’d always dyed eggs together. Oh well, things were bound to change eventually…

Not really.

Momma and Aunt Lavern loaded up the Cadillac and brought Easter to Baylor University complete with THREE dozen hard-boiled eggs. My sister, cousin and I dyed those eggs while staying at the Best Western across from campus.

That, my friends, is the definition of a fun Momma.

Baylor 1981

And yes, I’m wearing a tube top.

Grace Grits and Gardening

Musical Pairing:

The Power of Love, Huey Lewis

Naturally Dyed Easter Eggs

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Although my nest is empty, I still love to dye Easter eggs. This year I decided to dye eggs using food and spices on hand.

I started with red onion skins, blackberries, cinnamon (ground & sticks), green onion tops and cilantro, beet juice and turmeric.

After boiling water, steep each ingredient for ten minutes while grinding and stirring the various ingredients to release the juices. Add 1 Tablespoon of white vinegar to each glass.

To enhance a few of the colors, I added a bit of ground cayenne pepper to the cinnamon, spinach leaves to the green and a splash of red wine to the blackberry. (Next time, I would not use green onions—spinach worked better.)

The beet juice produced a beautiful rose color. The turmeric was vibrant. Soak in the refrigerator overnight for best results.

naturally dyed easter eggs
(left to right) purple onion, spinach/cilantro, blackberry/wine, cinnamon/cayenne, beet, turmeric
A word about boiling eggs: The eggs we buy today are very fresh (i.e. free range, etc.) The fresher the egg, the harder to peel—the white membrane is not mature and sticks to the shell. A teaspoon of baking soda in the boiling water will make the egg easier to peel.
And don’t forget to use the eggshells in your garden. Crushed and sprinkled around flowerbeds, they will fend off slugs. Or mix with your soil as compost.
Happy Easter!
Grace Grits and Gardening

Food. Farm. Garden. Life.

THANKS FOR READING!