Pickled Eggs: The Solution to Surplus Eggs

Pickled Eggs:  The Solution to Surplus Eggs

My rule is that I will not sell eggs that are 2 weeks old or older.  Not that they aren't any good after that point, I just don't feel like they are at their peak freshness at that point.  If they aren't sold within 2 weeks of being laid, then we will keep them and use them ourselves or give them away to family, friends, or our favorite local food bank.

During the farmers market season, selling our extra eggs before the two week mark isn't a problem.  They were always laid during the week leading up to the Saturday morning market and I always sell out of eggs at the market, so the eggs that were sold were never more than a week old.  But now that farmers market season is over, and our girls are still laying at full production, we have found ourselves with a surplus of eggs since we are still new to the whole egg-selling thing and haven't found our market yet.

So when a friend of mine mentioned she had pickled some of the eggs she bought from me, I knew I wanted to pickle some eggs for us to try.  We all love pickled eggs, but we usually buy them from the store.  This was a new experience.

I did some searching online for a simple recipe that didn't have crazy ingredients and wouldn't be time consuming to make and it had to have good reviews.  I found several.  So I picked one to try and went with it.

Here's the recipe:

16 hard boiled eggs
2 containers of beets with juice
1 cup white vinegar
1 cup white sugar
1 cup water
1 teaspoon cinnamon (optional, but I used it)

Hard boil eggs:
Put raw eggs into the bottom of a pot.  Be sure to use a pot that has a fitted lid.  Fill the pot with cold water so the water level is about an inch above the eggs.  Heat to boiling on medium high heat.  As soon as the eggs begin to boil. remove the pot from the heat and cover with the lid.  Let them sit for 12 minutes covered.  While you're waiting, fill a bowl with cold water and ice (ice bath).  Once the 12 minutes is up, removed the eggs from the pot and place them into the ice bath to halt the cooking process.  Leave them in the ice bath for one minute to cool.  Remove from ice bath, tap on counter and gently roll to break the shells.  Carefully peel the egg shells, rinse the peeled eggs, and place them in the container that you will be using for your pickled eggs.

Juice:
In a pot, combine 1 cup water, 1 cup white sugar, 1 cup vinegar, and 2 containers of beets with the juice.  You can also add 1 teaspoon of cinnamon if you want.  I added it to mine.  Heat on medium and stir until the sugar is dissolved.  Pour liquid and beets over the eggs.  Refrigerate for 4 hours.

Easy enough, huh?

These eggs are really yummy!  They didn't last long at all before everyone had eaten them!  The cinnamon flavor is exceptional.  They aren't like the pickled eggs we usually buy in the grocery store.  I'm sure the cinnamon made the difference and maybe even the sugar.  I will definitely be making more of these and I'll also try them without the cinnamon and possibly without the sugar to see if I can get them a little closer to that normal pickled egg flavor.

Enjoy!!