The following recipe is from one of my old cookbooks, “The Lady’s Assistant Cookbook” published in 1777. It takes a little while to become familiar with reading old works. Enjoy!

Boil the eggs very hard; peel them, and put them into cold water, shifting them till they are cold. Make a pickle of white-wine vinegar, a blade of mace, a bunch of sweet herbs, and a little whole pepper; take the eggs out of the water, and put them immediately into the pickle, which must be hot; stir them a good while, that they may look all alike; untie the herbs, and spread them over the top of the pot, but cover them with nothing else till they are turned brown; they will be fit to eat in nine or ten days.

Bruise some cochineal; tie it up in a rag; dip it in the vinegar, squeeze it gently over the egg, and then let the rag lie in the pickle. This is a great addition.

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The Lady’s Assistant Cookbook

I did not have any cochineal on hand but instead used a couple of slices of beet for the red color. Cochineal is actually a parasite that when exposed to heat can be used to produce crimson dye. I’ll stick with beets.

For sweet herbs, you can use various combinations such as thyme, parsley, sweet marjoram, savory or sage, sweet marjoram, thyme, and mint. Use what you like and have on hand or growing in your garden which is what the cook would have done back in 1777.

For my eggs, I used a combination of thyme, parsley, and sage.

Here is my quick and easy way to peel eggs. I’m not sure where I found the idea but it works like a charm and I’ve been peeling them with a spoon for as long as I can remember.