Lemon-painted Eggs

 - by KitchenPantryScientist

We’ve often used the water from boiling red cabbage to make Litumus (acid-indicator) paper, but last year, we used it to make egg dye!  Simply follow the directions here to make your cabbage “juice” and put hard boiled eggs in the cabbage juice to dye them blue.  Boil your eggs in the cabbage juice and refrigerate them in the juice overnight for the best color!  The juice turns pink when you add an acid to it, so when your eggs are dry, you can paint pink designs on them with lemon juice or vinegar using paintbrushes, toothpicks or Q-tips.  You can also dissolve baking soda in water (which makes a base) to add more color to the eggs (greenish-blue which shows up when they dry.)  Here’s a video of a demonstration I did on Kare11 news of this experiment.

Try some other natural egg dyes!  Boil colorful fruit, vegetables and spices with 4-8 cups water and a few Tbs. of white vinegar.  When the water is boiling, add raw eggs and boil for 10 minutes.  The pigment in the fruits and veggies will be absorbed by the egg’s porous surface as they cook.  Let the eggs sit in the dye until cool.  Then, wrap the wet eggs in onion skins or rub with paprika for yellow.  We had the best luck with blueberries, curry and red cabbage.  Experiment  to see what makes the best colors!  What worked best for you?  Coffee?  Tea?  rhubarb? Don’t forget to eat your creations.  Hard-boiled eggs make a great snack!

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