Thursday, August 30, 2012

An overabundance of eggs!

We are being swamped with eggs!
Yesterday I made mayonnaise and meringues. I used up 6 eggs. Six eggs out of about a million didn't make much difference!

The mayonnaise was a very simple recipe.

Five egg yolks.
2 teaspoons of dijon mustard 
and a splash of white balsamic vinegar.
Olive oil and/or canola oil

Whisk the yolks, mustard and vinegar together, then slowly add a wee bit of olive oil, whisking all the time. Keep adding small amounts until it begins to get thick. Then you can be a bit more liberal with the adding! Basically keep adding and tasting until it tastes as you like it. Season. ( I actually use a mix of olive oil and canola oil)



Next the meringues, to use up the egg whites. 

I have a fail safe recipe.
5 egg whites
250g sugar
oven up to 180.

Put egg whites in a bowl and whisk until soft peaks. Add the sugar in 3 batches making sure each lot is well whisked in before adding more. It should be glossy with fairly stiff peaks.

Put baking paper on a tray and place the meringue mixture any way you want. Sometimes I do one large meringue and make a sort of pav. This time I got out 2 trays and made 8 individual meringues.

Put into oven and immediately turn down to 140. Cook for 1 hour checking to make sure meringues aren't getting too much colour - if they are turn down the heat a bit. After an hour turn off oven, but leave meringues in until completely cooled. I can guarantee that this will work every time!



 In hind sight these were far too big. They are on a large dinner plate! However Lloyd and I managed to eat 2 each. I thought I was going to be sick!!


Today we decided to pickle the rest.

So we boiled up 30 eggs and peeled them, and let me tell you, it's not easy to peel 30 incredibly fresh, hard boiled eggs.  Some of them are rather less pretty than others!

Lloyd made up a huge pickling brine which had a lot of ingredients in it.  White wine vinegar, cider vinegar, (about 2 litres in total)  golden syrup, honey, brown sugar, pickling spice, toasted black mustard seeds, fennel seeds, star anise, ginger, red and green peppercorns, one small onion finely chopped, lemon zest, the juice of a lemon and half a t-spoon of salt. Bring to the boil, simmer for 10 minutes and allow to cool.
He did it by feel, but I have to say it smelt absolutely lovely. It's a sweetish pickling brine.

Once it's cool put the eggs in jars (with room to move around a wee bit), cover with the brine and voila! In 2 weeks time, lovely pickled eggs.
 ( as an aside there was FAR too much brine, so we've bottled it and will use it for the next batch.)


Thirty hard boiled eggs, not the prettiest thing in the word!!
 

And here they are, in all their glory. I think a smaller jar of these, would actually make a rather nice pressie!


27 comments:

  1. Pickled eggs! I have never made or heard of them, but we have heaps of eggs and I want to give this a go. Thanks for the idea!

    ReplyDelete
  2. I will have to try that mayonnaise when I get too many eggs! It will be awhile though, we only have 2 laying hens at the moment ha ha!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. do you only have 2 hens? I bet you get more! They're addictive!

      Delete
  3. Anonymous10:49 am

    My Mom used to pickle eggs in beet juice for easter, they were so pretty and very good.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. That's so funny, cos Lloyd mentioned that as well. I'd never heard of it before.

      Delete
  4. Hmm - I wish your girls will have a chat with mine. They started laying again but then 2 of them went broody (we only have 4 hens) and of the 2 that didn't, I'm getting 1 egg a day. Hardly enough for our family of 4 :(

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Lilian, you just need more chickens! Let the broody ones raise some!!!

      Delete
  5. Did you realise there is a whale eye in the bottom of the photo of your egg jar on the bench?
    Apart from my vivid imagination, ...I meant to say, pickled eggs, have no idea what they are like..? have you tried them before?
    Watch out for that lovely whale!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. oh! You're right so there is - you mad woman, you!! PIckled eggs - lovely - in the Uk there's always a jar in Fish and Chip shops or behind the bar of ye olde pub!!

      Delete
  6. Yum, which I could pop over for a feed. I've never tried pickled eggs, what are they like?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. they are lovely, sort of vinegary eggs - honest = really nice!

      Delete
  7. We gave up on trying to find a million recipes for eggs and started feeding them back to the critters. Chickens get them mixed in their food and so do the dogs and before we butchered our pig he loved to find eggs in his scrpas pan! Although our pony will eat them right out of the egg basket if she sees them before we carry them up to the house! Stevie@ruffledfeathersandspilledmilk.com

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. We do give our dogs one each with their dinner and I give to all our friends and neighbours. :)That's very cool about your pony though - wonder if our donkeys would do that!

      Delete
  8. i love pickled eggs but haven't made them for 20+ years when we had chooks and an egg glut.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You need to get yourself some more chickens! :)

      Delete
  9. Ha I feel the same way. I came back from 10 days away and Tall D hadn't taken any eggs....so I had 32 in total. I sent five with him, 10 to my landlords, 8 to the neighbors, and finally used two tonight for my french toast! Since both gals are laying for the moment.....that's 2 a day and it's just me to eat them!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Could you trade them with anyone - I do eggs for avocados with one of our neighbours - I actually think I win but she thinks she does!

      Delete
  10. I wish I lived near you right now! The kids have been requesting boiled eggs and I seem to be making lots of family sized quiches (in lasagne dishes) and frittata's lately. I always seem to be buying eggs and wishing I had a few chooks in the backyard!

    xx Susan

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I wish you did too! I'd happily donate to the cause!

      Delete
  11. Anonymous11:11 am

    Lemon curd!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. yep, make it - got loads of lemons too - yummy!

      Delete
  12. Anonymous1:29 pm

    Yummy I have the same problem. I've been giving away to friends but I'm going to make mayo and lemon curd.
    Thanks for habit great timing for me.
    Sam

    ReplyDelete
  13. That reminds me I must make some Mayo today, I use virtually the same recipe as you, works everytime.

    I pickle our Pekin eggs, they are half the size of normal eggs but with very big yolks, they look so cute in little jars. I used to sell them at the Farmers Markets, they went down a treat. Great to put into the middle of a Scotch Egg too, the vinegary tastes work really well.

    Sue xx

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It's fail safe isnt it! I've tried to do it other ways, but this way is always the best. Lloyd likes the idea of putting a pickled egg in the middle of a scotch egg - he made some a while back. I was offered a couple of guinea foul yesterday! Supposedly they lay quite small eggs. I love them, but lloyd thinks they are a bit noisy!

      Delete
  14. Gosh Laura you've brought back a lovely childhood memory of my grandfather patiently sitting at the kitchen table stirring oil into the egg yolks a drop at a time to make the mayonnaise. Grandma used to always ask him because he was the only one who could sit still for that amount of time. Wish I had a photo of that. :)

    ReplyDelete

I love it when you leave me comments, it lets me know there are folk out there reading my ramblings! Thank you, I appreciate them loads and loads
Laura x