Egg and dye and oops.

I think I missed March...Oops...

Anyways, I learned something new about fresh eggs.  Really fresh eggs, straight from the chicken to my fridge, with no productivity scrub down...they are a little harder to dye.

Fresh eggs, dyed with Kool-Aid

Apparently, because chickens from large scale farms are kept in such close and unsanitary conditions, eggs are doused and scrubbed with hot water and who knows what else. So unlike the eggs I get, they don't have that special invisibile lining that helps keep bacteria from permeating the egg.  It's not something one usually thinks about, until you dye an egg with that lining.

This year I decided to try dying our eggs with Kool-Aid (Thanks Pinterest!) and while it was a decent success, a few of the eggs look almost scaly because of that lining.  Now, I wash my eggs.  Using a warm, wet paper towel, I wipe the eggs down, but I only immerse ones that are really dirty.  From what I've been told, this is best because eggshell is permeable and washing eggs can help push bacteria into the shell.  I honestly don't know if it's true, but I figure it can't hurt, as long as I remember to wash my hands whenever I handle eggs, and cook my eggs thoroughly when I use them in the kitchen.

But it seems in order to dye eggs, I have to remember to scrub them quite well before boiling them.  Not that these eggs aren't cool looking- quite the contrary...they almost seem like dragons eggs or alien eggs, which is a really neat effect.

Easter Dragon's Eggs

We might dye some more later, depending if there's time, and if we eat these in a timely fashion.  And I'll see if scrubbing the eggs doesn't make a difference.