Easter’s Over Deviled Eggs

On Friday I had to stop in at Chapel Hill Needlepoint to turn in two ornaments I had finished and pick up supplies for my next project. My stitching friends around the table had been having a multi-day conversation about deviled eggs, which I was quickly sucked into. Two major questions brewed; what was the best way to boil eggs to facilitate easy and clean peeling and what did I use in my stuffing?

As I have reported often in the past my mother is not much on cooking, but there are two things she makes famously, Tomato Aspic and Deviled eggs. She is of the simplicity in stuffing school, mustard, mayonnaise, and a touch of cider vinegar, garnished with a sprinkling of paprika for the touch of the devil. Simple as they are they are always yummy and no matter how many there are there are never enough. I tend to stick with that simple way my mother taught me, although I sometimes add a dash of hot sauce as my devil ingredient and never sprinkle paprika.

My favorite book on all things “Stuffed Eggs” as they call them is Being Dead Is No Excuse- The Official Southern Ladies guide to Hosting the Perfect Funeral.” The hysterical little book is half a cookbook and half a comedy comparing the difference between Episcopal and Methodist Funerals in the Mississippi Delta. Stuffed Eggs and Pimento Cheese have their own chapter in this book. The authors don’t say which makes a better stuffed egg, be it the savory type or the sweet, made so by the addition of sweet pickle relish. Even these two opinionated southerners know it’s best not to get in the middle of that fight. So it’s all a matter of what you like best to stuff in your eggs. I will go out on a limb and say the simpler the better. There is only so much room in half of an egg white.

Now to the big question of making easy to peel eggs. The older the egg before you boil it the easier it is to peel. I’m talking like at least a few weeks old. It does not matter if you start the eggs in a pot of cold water or put them into a boiling pot, it’s the age of the eggs that makes the inner membrane pull away from the shell. That being said how many of us plan weeks ahead when we are making deviled eggs? The best answer is found at the grocery store now—boiled and peeled eggs – all the work is done for you for just a dollar or two more than raw eggs. They taste exactly like you boiled them yourself with none of the work.

So if you have a bunch of dyed eggs sitting around your house and were thinking of making deviled eggs, don’t, throw them away and buy the ones that already peeled. I know it may sound wasteful, but the peeling time you will save is worth it. What you stuff in them is up to you, but I bet you will do it just like your mother.