A different sort of decorating
Mar. 31st, 2018 07:20 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
offcntrBecause I'm mostly out of bisque-ware, I got to take the afternoon off from glazing to decorate Easter eggs. This is a very cool technique I came across online using onionskins for color, with step-by-step instructions here.
To begin with, we collected a bunch of greenery from the lawn--grape hyacinth, dandelion and lawn daisy blossoms, leaves from clover, violets, plantain, blackberry, dandelion, wild geranium. Denise uses onionskins to dye paper pulp, so we had a fairly substantial supply, mostly from yellow onions, though there was one red one hiding out in the bottom of the box.
The tutorial says to moisten the onionskins; we found it easiest to dump a kettle of almost-boiling water on them to soften them up.
Take your raw egg and stick some moistened leaves, blossoms, scraps of red onionskin and such to the shell. Take softened yellow onionskins and wrap the whole egg thoroughly, overlapping as needed.
Use string or sewing thread to secure the material to the egg. The tighter the bind, the better the leaves will resist the dye. I found string to be easier to manage, but because we were using recycled bits, already cut, we always seemed to run out before we could tie it off. Thread is harder to cinch wet-handed, but there was always plenty of it.
When you've finished wrapping, pour the soaking water and any extra skins into your cookpot, and add water to cover. Bring to a boil and cook about 15 minutes. Drain the pot and add cold water to stop them cooking and cool enough to allow you to peel off the skins and leaves. Dress with a little oil or grease to add some shine if you wish, we didn't bother.
We found that the flowers left the best patterns, particularly the little lawn daisies, though the grape hyacinths left cute little clusters of white spots. I suspect more mature leaves might have made better resists, though a few of the clover and geranium leaves worked quite well, and Denise got one dandelion print that was pretty spectacular. And though the kitchen smelled of onions while they were cooking, it didn't seem to add any flavor or smell to the eggs themselves.
To begin with, we collected a bunch of greenery from the lawn--grape hyacinth, dandelion and lawn daisy blossoms, leaves from clover, violets, plantain, blackberry, dandelion, wild geranium. Denise uses onionskins to dye paper pulp, so we had a fairly substantial supply, mostly from yellow onions, though there was one red one hiding out in the bottom of the box.
The tutorial says to moisten the onionskins; we found it easiest to dump a kettle of almost-boiling water on them to soften them up.
Take your raw egg and stick some moistened leaves, blossoms, scraps of red onionskin and such to the shell. Take softened yellow onionskins and wrap the whole egg thoroughly, overlapping as needed.
Use string or sewing thread to secure the material to the egg. The tighter the bind, the better the leaves will resist the dye. I found string to be easier to manage, but because we were using recycled bits, already cut, we always seemed to run out before we could tie it off. Thread is harder to cinch wet-handed, but there was always plenty of it.
When you've finished wrapping, pour the soaking water and any extra skins into your cookpot, and add water to cover. Bring to a boil and cook about 15 minutes. Drain the pot and add cold water to stop them cooking and cool enough to allow you to peel off the skins and leaves. Dress with a little oil or grease to add some shine if you wish, we didn't bother.
We found that the flowers left the best patterns, particularly the little lawn daisies, though the grape hyacinths left cute little clusters of white spots. I suspect more mature leaves might have made better resists, though a few of the clover and geranium leaves worked quite well, and Denise got one dandelion print that was pretty spectacular. And though the kitchen smelled of onions while they were cooking, it didn't seem to add any flavor or smell to the eggs themselves.
no subject
Date: 2018-04-03 04:09 pm (UTC)