Pickled eggs

[PostModern]

Damn,

These must beer the best beer snacks ever! Homer Simpson is seldom wrong.

Equipment
1x Jar. Capable of holding 6-8 eggs.
1x Pot of larger capacity than above.

Ingredients
6-8 Eggs.
"enough" vinegar (Balsamic preferred, may cut with other vinegars by 20-40%)
Dash of red wine
Cloves of Garlic
Fresh Oregano/Basil/etc
Sea salt or "pickling" salt.


Method
1. Hard boil the eggs.

Ideally: you'd put the eggs into cold water to cover the eggs +1 inch of water, bring to the boil then turn off heat and leave the eggs in the hot water for not more and not less than 17 minutes, then plunge into a waiting ice bath until chilled, then back onto the boil for another minute before chilling again and storing in the fridge until needed OMG is that one sentence? PoMo ideally: boil them on Medium-High heat for 10-12 mins in very salty water than rapid chill. What the vinegar does to the eggs later more than make up for the laziness.

2. Boil the vinegar and other ingredients (maybe squish the garlic a bit) in the pot until you can no loger stand the smell.

3. Place the (shelled) boiled eggs into pre-heated jar (fill it from the kettle, let stand 1 min) and pour on the vinegar until the neck of the jar is reached.

4. Seal the jar while very hot, allow too cool to hand-holdable than place jar in fridge.

5. #5 Is the tough one: leave alone for 2 week, at least.

Open jar with a few cold beers.

Excellent stuff.

[paady]

So by shelled you mean the shell is removed or is it left on still.

[pugsley]

Yeah the shells aree removed before they go into the jar. Got any pics PM?

[Deckham]

4. Seal the jar while very hot, allow too cool to hand-holdable than place jar in fridge.

Would this not cause an expansion problem?

[SyN]

sour eggs? :/

[paady]

I would probably make a sweet type of pickled eggs.

Try Malt brown vinegar + Honey + All Spice.

[Agg]

Originally Posted by Deckham

Would this not cause an expansion problem?

Hot fluids are less dense than cold fluids (until you freeze them). So once it cools it will have LESS pressure inside than when hot. I imagine this is why you do it this way, so it seals the jar better.

[Odje]

Sounds like a lot of effort and waiting. Can I buy some pre-made? Never tried it before but it sounds pretty good, I like eggs and pickled cucumbers.

[Redback]

Originally Posted by Agg

Hot fluids are less dense than cold fluids (until you freeze them). So once it cools it will have LESS pressure inside than when hot. I imagine this is why you do it this way, so it seals the jar better.

expanding when frozen only happens with one substance - water

[scon]

If you want to peel boiled eggs easily, put them on a bench, place your palm over them and roll them on the bench while pushing down, cracking the shell the whole way around, then pick up and peel.

[PostModern]

They can be bought pickled. That's what got me to try and make my own. I bought a jar from a pickle/jam stand at the Thirroul Seaside festival. They are much cheaper to pickle yourself if you have a source for good eggs. I also doubt that the average craft stall pickler uses top notch vinegar, judging from what I tasted the commercial eggs were most likely done with cheap dark vinegar.

The reason to seal the jar hot is as Agg worked out, to seal the jar and exclude spoilage organisms. Nothing can be alive when the pickling solution is boiling hot, so sealing the jar with the hot liquid means that inside the jar will be sterile. I imagine the salt and acid from the vinegar would also be pretty inhospitable for bugs.

In any event they do taste something like a cross between boiled eggs and pickled gerkins. Interesting, tasty and especially more-ish.

(Ooops, I left sea salt out of the recipe, will edit it).

[Killing Time]

you get these in all the pubs and "chippies" in england malt vinegar is the way to go maybe with some chopped onions, you get pickled onions aswell same thing as the eggs but with small onions...

[Deckham]

Originally Posted by Agg

Hot fluids are less dense than cold fluids (until you freeze them). So once it cools it will have LESS pressure inside than when hot. I imagine this is why you do it this way, so it seals the jar better.

This is true, if there is absolutely no air inside at all.
If there is air, once the jar is tightly sealed, it will crack, break, or explode because the air will heat up and expand. Try it with a coke bottle.

[Predator]

For real? I would have though a coke bottle would have been able to handle a little positive pressure, given it's former contents....

PoMo, damm, another one of your recipies I'm going to have to try. Does it work better with smaller eggs or the super jumbo ones?

[Deckham]

Originally Posted by Predator

For real? I would have though a coke bottle would have been able to handle a little positive pressure, given it's former contents....

PoMo, damm, another one of your recipies I'm going to have to try. Does it work better with smaller eggs or the super jumbo ones?

The Coke bottle will not explode, which is why I suggested it, but the cap may pop off, so be careful if it's boiling water.