I’m intrigued with dyes in nature.  It’s the good stuff…green spinach and kale, pomegranate that dyes our fingers red when we pry those seeds out and anti-oxidant-rich blueberries.  This year, we are in the kitchen playing around with natural dyes.  And I started early so we could really get our technique down!  I did a little googling on the matter and was not surprised that red cabbage is a wonderful dye.  I was surprised however, to find that it dyes the eggs blue!  And boring old brown onion skins, who knew they make a perfect orange dye!?

Well, let’s get started!  Buy a handful of beets, a head of red cabbage and a brown onion…

Roughly chop your ingredients.  I’m not sure that heat helps release the dye, but I tried it, just in case.  The cabbage went over the stove top and the beets and onion were microwaved for a few minutes in separate bowls.

Leave the mixture to steep for at least 15 minutes and then strain it into a bowl or mason jar.  Add your hard-boiled eggs and decide how long you want to wait.  I left mine overnight in the fridge.

Here’s what I found out…the red cabbage and the onion skins were awesome!  They had rich vibrant color.  You could leave them in for an hour to have a pale color.  The beets left overnight just turned brown.  Boo!  But, when I had checked them after about an hour, they were a pale pink.   I predicted leaving them overnight would result in dark pink, alas brown was what we got.

These mimic robin’s eggs, in that they are slightly speckled and have varied color.  I love how rustic they are.  I think the possibilities are endless and I’m excited to try spinach and pomegranate seeds next!

//photographed at my home studio in Long Beach