Fabulous
Easter Eggs
Contributed by Cheri Sicard of Fabulous Foods

To make a rainbow of egg hues, you can use either liquid or paste food coloring, although I find using paste gives extra bright and, depending upon how large a dab of paste I use, more intense color.

You'll need a separate cup for each color, large enough to hold an egg and the liquid. Dissolve a dab of paste food color, or about 6-8 drops of regular liquid food color, in 1 cup of hot water. Stir in 1/4 cup distilled white vinegar and your egg dye is ready to go!

Abstract Eggs

• hard boiled eggs
• basic egg dyes in desired colors
• a jar of rubber cement

These eggs are really simple to make. The basic principle is, you drizzle rubber cement over the egg, let it dry, then color the egg. Naturally, the egg dye won't stick to the parts that are painted with the glue. After the egg is colored to the desired shade, let it dry completely, then carefully peel off the rubber cement.

You can paint the rubber cement on plain white eggs, like we did with the blue and white or green and white eggs above. Another option is to dye the egg with a base color, then apply the rubber cement and re-dip in a contrasting color. The most important tip is to dry the eggs completely between colors and or coats of rubber cement.

You can spatter over plain white eggs or put a base color on them first.

Protect your work area, spattering can make a big mess-- but it is lots of fun! A cardboard box, placed on its side, is a good spatter protector. Simply place the egg in the box and try to contain most of the spatters in the box.

When you're ready to spatter, pick up your brush and dip it in the liquid color, hold it close to the egg and starting at the the end of the brush closest to the egg, draw the wooden skewer across the brush, towards yourself (see photo). As the skewer passes over the bristles, this will cause the color to spatter onto the egg. Don't draw the skewer away from yourself as you'll end up spattering you-know-who.

Repeat with as many colors as you desire, turning the egg to spatter all sides. We found that the top of any empty egg carton was a great holder for the egg while it was being spattered, as well as for drying.

Why buy packaged egg coloring kits when you probably already have everything you need right in your pantry?