Avocado Dyed Easter Eggs
A dusty pink natural egg dye just in time for Easter.
Blush beauties to fill your Easter table. These eggs where so fun to make - I love avocado dye, and am excited to share this simple project with you.
I have found avocados to be the easiest and most rewarding natural dye. You start with something you would normally just discard, add a bit of water and heat it slowly, and a rich pink dye bath is the result. My Sweet Pea Guacamole recipe uses three avocado pits, which will be the number of pits you need for this recipe. You can include the avocado skins as well to make dye, I have kept it to just pits to show how potent avocado dye is from just a few leftover pits.
Eggs need no mordant to hold dye, yet I did find if I rolled the eggs in soy milk first it brought out a deeper pink color. Soy milk is a natural bonding agent, like a mordant that allows protein to bond to natural materials (cotton, wool, and in this case, eggshell) and the protein holds color better than just the natural material on its own.
I will be sharing my more detailed post on mordanting and dyeing fabrics, but this project will be a great start to get yourself started on playing with natural dyes.
With most natural dyes you should use a dedicated dye pot, but dyeing with avocados is non-toxic, so you can use a regular stock pot. I would encourage if you are dyeing fibers to invest in a stock pot, but for eggs, use your own pots and pans for cooking. Eggs shells are safe to dye with avocado, but if you see any cracks or breakage of the shell while dyeing, discard those eggs and do not consume. This project should have hard boiled eggs at room temperature for one hour. Follow food safety guidelines and do not leave hard boiled eggs out for more than two hours.
Avocado dyed eggs
12 hard boiled eggs - this is a large dye bath, you could dye double this many eggs in this dye bath
6c. Water
3 avocado pits
1c. organic soy milk (optional)
Rinse your avocado pits well to remove any of the avocado flesh.
Add pits and water to a stock pot.
Cover and heat over medium-low for 1 hour. Do not let the dye simmer of boil, as this will brown or dull the color. Turn off heat and let steep on the counter for 4 hours or up to overnight.
Reheat the avocado pits over medium-low heat for 30 minutes, then strain into a container with a lid.
(optional) While the avocado pits warm, dip each egg into a dish of soy milk, coating the shell. Let them sit on a wire rack to dry for15-30 minutes.
Place your hard boiled eggs into the warm dye and cover the container.
Let the eggs sit in the dye for 30 minutes on the counter for a soft pink. For a deeper pink, place the covered container in the fridge overnight and remove from the dye bath the next day. Let eggs dry on a wire rack and enjoy.
