Are you drowning in Easter eggs? If you know your family isn’t going to be able to eat all those hard cooked eggs, you may want to turn some of them into deviled eggs or an egg salad. My kids LOVE eggs. Between the baking I do and the ones we eat, I can hardly keep them in the house. I buy the five dozen mega pack about every other week. Sometimes more. 

These deviled eggs are the classic recipe made with mustard and vinegar, but my kids, friends, and family love them. As soon as I finished taking pictures, the kids came running to have one. I have one friend who actually pays me to make them for her when her work has a potluck. And one of her co-workers comments on them almost every time I see him. He thinks they are that good. Take these to a potluck, and you are guaranteed to go home with an empty plate.

I have seen a lot of questions, tutorials, and articles about how to boil eggs recently. It seems like it should be easy, but everyone seems to have a method that works best for him or her. It may seem simple, but there are actually several different factors to consider–cracks while cooking, shells that stick, a green ring around the yolk, and of course a sufficiently cooked egg. I think altitude can also affect the outcome and which method works best. I will show you what has always worked best for me here in Colorado. I usually make a dozen at a time, and I do occasionally have one or two in a batch with the green ring, so my method is not perfect according to all standards, but the eggs are cooked well, peel easily, and work for us.

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Classic Deviled Eggs

Ingredients:

• 12 hard-boiled eggs
• 1/2 cup salad dressing or mayonnaise (I always use light Miracle Whip)
• 2 teaspoons mustard (I use classic yellow, but you could alter the flavor with another type you prefer)
• 2 teaspoons distilled white vinegar
• salt and pepper to taste (I use about 1/4 teaspoon each)
• Optional: garnish with paprika or parsley

Directions:

1. Peel and rinse your hard-boiled eggs. Slice them in half the long way.
2. Put egg yolks into a small bowl and set the whites aside. (If your eggs are cooked well, you should be able to just pop the yolks out easily.)
3. Use a fork to mash the yolks until they are evenly-sized crumbles.
4. Add the salad dressing, mustard, vinegar, and salt and pepper to the yolks and stir to combine thoroughly.
5. Spoon or pipe the yolk mixture back into the egg whites, distributing the filling evenly among the twelve whites. (The first time I made deviled eggs, I used a spoon to put the yolk mixture back into the whites, and it was a MISERABLE experience. I decided I was never making them again because it was such a pain and a mess. They tasted too good to quit, though, so now I have a better method that takes me maybe five minutes and is neat and tidy. I place a quart-size zip top bag into a drinking glass, folding the top over the side of the glass to make a sort of collar. I then spoon all of the filling into the bag-lined drinking glass. I remove the bag, press the filling down into the bottom of the bag, and zip it closed. I snip one corner of the bag with scissors and fill my eggs quickly and easily.)
6. Optional: Sprinkle paprika or parsley over the top of the eggs.
7. Refrigerate until ready to use. (I think the eggs taste best when they are prepared a little bit in advance and have time for the flavors to blend, but you can eat them immediately as well.)

Source: I copied the recipe down from a friend’s cook book years ago. I am not sure of the book.

Note: How I cook my eggs

1. Fill the bottom of a pot with however many eggs you want to make. The pot must be big enough to accommodate the eggs in a single layer.
2. Cover the eggs with cold water. The water level should be an inch or so above the eggs.
3. Place the eggs on a stove burner and turn the heat to high.
4. Cook until the water comes to a boil–more than just a few bubbles but not a full boil.
5. Turn the heat off, cover the pan, and set the timer for 14 minutes. Leave the pan on the burner.
6. When the time is up, immediately pour the water out of the pan and rinse with cold water. I cover the eggs with cold water and then dump it out at least twice. Cover the eggs with water again and then put a generous amount of ice in the pot to chill the eggs as quickly as possible. (This step is supposed to make the shells come off without sticking.)
7. Let the eggs chill until the ice melts and then refrigerate the eggs until ready to use. I seem to have the best luck peeling my eggs when I cook them ahead of time and the eggs have time to chill in the refrigerator for a while.

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Category: Appetizers Tags: appetizers, eggs

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