Everything gets so very eggy post Easter.  As Rosie remarked,  “It’s so much funner to dye the eggs than eat them! ”

After long months in the darkness of winter with no fresh eggs,  the first precious,  warm,  new-laid eggs are beautiful protein-rich gifts of spring,  the bright yolks golden as the orb of the sun. 

Easter,  this old celebration of the springing of renewed life and the triumph of the light over darkness,  is much older than what it celebrates now.  The first Sunday after the first full moon after the Equinox, a holiday of the gaining of the light,  the balance of our existence tipped towards the sun instead of the dark void of space.  And chickens,  the light-sensitive beings that they are,  have done their part with the other birds of spring to get busy and lay eggs… more eggs and more eggs and more eggs. 

We are quite used to eggs by now, big bowls of them cluttering up the counter,  boiled,  fried,  poached,  baked into eggy coconut based cakes, beaten into eggy crepes and popovers, made into salad,  stuffed….

 Could it be that everyone is even tired of the dressed-up-fancy deviled egg in my household,  and why, then, did they insist on dyeing a whole dozen each, not too mention the goose eggs? 

Last year we tried this interesting French recipe for stuffed eggs. And this year i cut through all the groans of “Not eggs again! ” with two completely new kinds of deviled eggs.  

#1: Ranch Style Deviled Eggs

1 dozen hard boiled eggs

1 heaped tablespoon onion granules

A pinch of salt

2 Tablespoons mayonnaise

10 or so large sprigs of parsley (save some for garnish too)

Paprika

1. Carefully peel the eggs, maybe wiping then down first if they are sandy from the egg hunt, and slice them in half with a sharp knife.
2. Push out the yolks into a bowl and mash thoroughly with a fork, reserving the egg whites.
3. Add the salt and onion powder,  and then stir in the mayo gradually (helps smooth out any lumps) 
4. Chop the parsley very fine,  saving some leaves for garnish, and stir into the yolk mixture. 
5. Fill reserved egg whites with spoonfuls of the yolk mixture.  Sprinkle with paprika and decorate each egg with a parsley leaf. 

#2: Curry Masala Deviled Eggs

This recipe requires a certain masala we discovered at the local Chinese market (Chun Ching off 8th avenue if you are local to Gainesville area). It has all good ingredients – all real spices and no synthetic flavor chemicals,  and it even has asafoetida, or Devils’ Dung, the dried latex sap of certain roots,  which makes it more of a deviled egg than mere mustard powder would. The flavor of this masala is shockingly spicy and tasty, and we’ve been kind of addicted to it and adding it to weird things to see what it’s like. 

1 dozen hard boiled eggs

1 Tablespoon curry powder

A pinch of salt

2 Tablespoons mayonnaise

Several sprigs of cilantro,  plus more for garnish

Pickle masala,  in necessarily small quantities

1. Carefully peel the eggs, maybe wiping then down first if they are sandy from the egg hunt, and slice them in half with a sharp knife.
2. Push out the yolks into a bowl and mash thoroughly with a fork, reserving the egg whites.
3. Add the salt and curry powder, and then stir in the mayo gradually ( This helps smooth out the lumps) 
4. Very finely chop most of the cilantro,  except for the garnish,  and stir in to the yolk mixture. 
5. Fill reserved egg whites with spoonfuls of the yolk mixture.  Sprinkle with a generous pinch of the masala, and decorate with cilantro.