Growing up in a Vietnamese-Catholic family meant that Easter
signaled the end of Lent, going to church and returning home for a big meal of
homemade Viet fare. My mom let me dye eggs when I was young so I could
experience the American tradition but she never really took to the idea. Eggs
were a versatile food to her so why commit yourself to cooking all your eggs by
one method?
My siblings thought I was cute for dyeing them but they were
too old to get into it much. I am the youngest in a line-up of five. My father
was a soft-boiled egg kind of man. To him, boiled eggs were destined to be
simmered with fatty pork, caramel sauce, and coconut juice for thit heo kho
trung, a southern Viet classic.
Wouldn’t you know it but I was left with figuring out what
to do with the hard-boiled Easter eggs. I typically only boil a dozen eggs. My
afterschool, post-Easter snack often included deviled eggs. If there was
homemade mayonnaise around, they’d taste extra good. Otherwise, store bought
stuff was fine. I’d tinker with all kinds of seasonings to make the eggs ‘special.’
Curry powder, pickle relish, green onion, and dijon mustard were ingredients I’d
play with. Recipes from late 1970s magazines and cookbooks were my sources for
inspiration. Piping the yolk mixture into the whites didn’t go well for me as a
precocious 10-year-old.
But frankly, a kid can eat so many deviled eggs. Inevitably
I’d ask my mom to make salade Russe, a Russian potato, carrot and egg salad
colored magenta by boiled beets. She boiled all the vegetables and let me peel
and cut them. Eggs were usually part of the tangy rich mixture and I already
had them. (Convenient!)
By making the potato salad with the hard-boiled eggs,
the rest of the Easter eggs were used. It’s not like I tricked my family into
participating in my Easter egg activities. They just needed to see them in a
different light. That’s the beauty of repurposing leftovers.
For your hard-boiled egg and Easter pleasure, here are some recipes and tips:
- Deviled
eggs and Kewpie Mayonnaise (An instant feel-good food) - North
Indian Egg Curry (Anda Masala) - Impromptu
potato salad (similar to the salade Russe I grew up with) - Deviled
egg tips (how to keep the yolk centered!) - Perfectly
peeled boiled eggs (video tip) - Hard-boiled
egg tips
How do you use up leftover Easter eggs? Or, simply put, what’s your favorite use for hard-boiled eggs?
Long Ho says
Thit kho chung all the way! Do you have a recipe to share? I ask my mom to make them as often as I can when I visit her.
Karen says
Our family Easter breakfast tradition was what my mom called "Creamed Eggs on Toast". She made a bechamel sauce (we called it white sauce) and put the sliced hard-boiled eggs in it. She would ladle this over toast points. Toppings offered would include crispy crumbled bacon, shredded cheddar, and tiny chopped green onions. Sometimes she would put crumbled pork sausage into the sauce. We thought this was really fancy with the toast points and all. It's still my favorite breakfast.
Abbe@This is How I Cook says
I always loved dying eggs. Maybe it is because we were Jewish! My mother then used the hard boiled eggs in chopped liver!
Maggie says
With roasted peppers and anchovies:
http://www.womanandhome.com/recipes/291396/roasted-pepper-and-anchovy-salad-with-mimosa-eggs
As a garnish for salmorejo:
http://www.spanish-fiestas.com/recipes/salmorejo/
Andrea Nguyen says
Love it. The recipe I use is in "Into the Vietnamese Kitchen", in the meat chapter. Your local bookstore or library may have the book; Amazon surely does. I've been thinking that coconut water would be great instead of super sweet coconut juice. But I don't have a sweet tooth.
Andrea Nguyen says
What a great idea for completely turning Easter eggs into an exciting dish that takes your mind away from the idea that well, there's a whole bunch of boiled eggs in the fridge... Your mom was a smartie.
Andrea Nguyen says
LOL -- a perfect Jewish use of hard-boiled eggs. I love a good chopped liver. So hard to find it these days. Lucky you.
Andrea Nguyen says
Nice! Anchovies and eggs are a wondrous rustic combination. Creamy egg, brusk salted fish. Nice with drinks.
Katie says
I'm fairly boring with my eggs. I make a giant egg salad. I'm the only one that eats it and it's the only time of year I let myself make it. I don't even make a fancy one- just celery, eggs, onion, and mayo. But it tastes so good since I love it so much and get it so rarely.
This year's was funny looking though. I dyed my eggs with koolaide and there's red flecks everywhere.
Long Ho says
Thanks for the tip! I just picked up your book from Amazon. Looking forward to trying out some of your recipes and surprising my parents with them some day.
Doris says
You pretty much mentioned my favorites ways to have hard-boiled eggs in your post---thit heo kho trung (the fattier the pork the better!) and deviled eggs. When I make deviled eggs, I like to add chopped up sweet or Datil pepper pickles (a cool find at the local farmers market) and sometimes Sriracha (did this for Halloween and appropriately called them "Satanic Deviled Eggs", lol).