Sephardic Marbled Eggs

Sephardic Marbled Eggs
My friend (and colleague) Rabbi Cory Weiss loves to cook as much as I do. Several years ago, we decided to co-host a pre-Passover program at his synagogue, Temple Har Zion (Thornhill, Ontario): Iron Chef Rabbi. We decided rather than make this an actual competition, we would each present our favorite Passover dishes. One of the dishes Cory cooked was this beautiful Sephardic Marbled Eggs. It is visually stunning! His version takes hours and hours to cook, and is imbued with the subtle flavor of onions. I adapted his recipe to suit my own taste. I decided that I am only interested in the "visual appeal" of the egg, and wasn't concerned with the slight onion taste. Because his eggs cooked for so long, the yolks became a deep gray color. I wanted to see if I could achieve the marble-affect while maintaining the yolk's yellow integrity. (My usual method of cooking hard-boiled eggs provides smooth and creamy yellow yolks always: cover a pot of eggs with cold water and cover the pot with a lid. Bring the pot to a boil and boil for exactly 2 minutes. Remove the covered pot from the heat source, keep covered and let the eggs sit for exactly 12 minutes. Then immediately shock them in cold water and ice cubes. Voila! Perfectly yellow creamy yolks every time!) With this recipe, however, the whites of the egg need to become dyed and colored. The color needs to permeate the membrane that lies underneath the shell. The eggs need to cook for a longer time than I would normally cook a hard-boiled egg. So it is impossible to get perfectly yellow yolks, but I was able to keep the layer of gray to only the outer edges. I usually make 1 egg per person, plus extras to have on hand during the week. You can either choose to serve with lemon wedges and salt (as is the traditional method) or I like it serve it as an appetizer with homemade guacamole (I make my guac by just mashing ripe avocados with lime juice, garlic, salt and pepper to taste) and crudites. Enjoy!

Ingredients

Preparation:
15 min
Cooking:
25 min
Ready in:
1 h 10 min

Instructions

  1. Place some of the onion skins and 2 tea bags on the bottom of a large pot. Place some of the eggs on top. Layer more onion skins in the pot and add the rest of the eggs and tea bags. Finish with the rest of the onion skins
  2. Cover everything with water. (Make sure the pot is NOT filled to the top with water. You don't want it boiling over the top).
  3. Bring the pot to a boil and let boil for 4 minutes.
  4. Turn off the stove. Now comes the tricky part: (be very careful, everything is HOT: use two spoons (and an extra large bowl to place the eggs in as you crack them), carefully remove the eggs from the water one-by-one and gently crack the shell of each one all over with the back of a spoon (you want the shell to be cracked all over). Once all the eggs are gently cracked, place all of the cracked eggs BACK INTO THE POT WITH THE ONION SKINS AND TEA BAGS.
  5. Cover the pot again with the lid. Turn the heat back on and gently boil the eggs for another 20 minutes. (The color needs to seep through the cracks in the shells and through the membrane of the eggs).
  6. After 20 minutes, turn off the stove and take the pot off the heat.
  7. KEEP THE POT COVERED. LET THE EGGS SIT IN THE COVERED POT FOR ABOUT 1/2 HOUR - ONE HOUR (the longer the eggs sit in the pot, the better the marbling effect, but also the yolks will get more "gray" - I prefer the yolks more yellow, so I let them sit less time.)
  8. Run the eggs under cold water to cool. Peel the shells immediately and VOILA! MARBLED EGGS! Serve with lemon wedges and salt and pepper, or with guacamole, hearts of palm, crudite or be creative!

Notes

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