Saturday, April 08, 2006

Frugal Feast: Stuffed Eggs

fCan you tell we love those cheap egg dishes?

I made stuffed (or deviled) eggs my specialty as a young bride. My husband, then youth director at a small church, had lots of potluck on the calendar.

I found that I could prepare a huge tray of stuffed eggs for under $2.

My aunts all teased me, showing up to every family function with yet ANOTHER platter...yet laugh as they did, the eggs would be among the first foods to disappear.

Now I keep them on hand as a low-carb protein snack for my husband, substituting homemade yogurt for mayonnaise to cut down on the fat.

Leave it to vintage Tupperware to make storing stuffed eggs easy: these egg keepers are the only lidded container that won't smush the filling.

Otherwise, I like to arrange them on a bed of lettuce in a flat basket, garnishing each half with paprika and minced parsley.

Publix advertised a deli stuffed egg platter for $16 this week--but each carton of 12 raw eggs costs only 69 cents. When you make stuffed eggs at home, you are saving a bundle!

12 comments:

Laura Talbert said...

I would like to find one of those Tupperware egg-carriers. Handy, dandy.

Is it hard to make homemade yogurt? Do you need any special do-me-doggies?

the fallow field said...

I think I will be adding an egg carrier to my car boot searches for vintage Tuperware! What a great idea.

Mrs. Happy Housewife said...

At our house, every Easter, Christmas, and New Year's Day must have devilled eggs. We put sliced green olives instead of parsley on top. Do you put mayo (or yogurt), mustard, and pickle relish in your egg yolk mixture?

MommyLydia said...

I never realized it was THAT cheap. Yes, Devilled eggs is the first dish to go at any potluck that has them. And they are actually very easy to make the last time I had to take a breakfast dish I found out.

Only problem for me is -- husband gets sick at the smell of eggs :( So they won't work for him. I'll remember they are low-carb for me (though I thin they will mess up my chlosterol so maybe still a no-no)

Those Tupperware containers? Also great for brownies and cookies. We RARELY used it for eggs. The one I have doesn't even have egg plates, but I still consider it a must-have piece for the kitchen.

Wish they still sold good Tupperware :(

Mom2fur said...

My mother makes the best deviled eggs. Her secret ingredient, believe it or not, is a pinch of sugar. I think it offsets the vinegar.
I've never heard them called 'stuffed eggs,' LOL!

Jenn @ Frugal Upstate said...

#1, I can't believe you did all this preparation while preggo! Oh my word, you must be absolutely EXHAUSTED!

The eggs are great-and cheap :) My problem is that I will continuosly go back and eat them until they are gone....

As for Lady Laura's question on the yogurt-there is a really good tutorial on Hillbilly Housewife that tells you various methods of making it with stuff you should already have. I haven't yet tried it, but it is one of the next efforts on my own personal "try it then blog about it" quest.

The link is http://www.hillbillyhousewife.com/yogurt.htm

Her entire recipe section is pretty good if you haven't checked it out!

Roberta said...

When son #1 was little he called them "doubled eggs", and was HORRIFIED when I told him they were "deviled"...so *doubled eggs* has stuck.
You have accomplished so much, well done! :)

Anonymous said...

Meredith, a fellow deviled egg lover here. I purchased for a quarter, after Easter a couple years ago at WalMart, an egg display tray with all the little scooped out places for a couple dozen decorated eggs to rest. Works great for the D.E.! So go haunt the post-Easter sales ladies : )

Debbie

BTW, GREAT GREAT GREAT dogwood/vintage (VanBriggle?) arrangement in the photo.

Anonymous said...

M: Consider publishing your devil egg recipe?

I have always used pickle relish but since lower-carbing, and steering clear of high fructose corn syrup, will prob be making my own relish from here on out. I concur with an earlier poster, needs a spot of sweet. My friend makes her own maple syrup and cans all pickles/relishes with it. SO yummy. Debbie

Meredith said...

Thank you, Debbie. I use the sugar free pickle relish--to me, the sweet is a must. Pickles are one of the few SF foods I can eat without the unpleasant side effects--most use Splenda alone to sweeten, not malitol. Even good SF relish is so cheap, you'd have to have a few rows of pickling cucumbers to make your own cost-effective.

Meredith said...

My basic filling mixture is mayonnaise (or yogurt for home use), a squirt of yellow mustard, plenty of salt and pepper, a teaspoon of Worcestershire sauce (a hint from Miss Daisy), sweet relish squeezed to remove extra juice---oh, and paprika on top for decoration. Parsley if I have it.

I don't really measure anymore, but the eggs always taste good anyway.

Anonymous said...

Thanks M,... Miss Daisy! My mom has an old Miss Daisy cookbook (she's a Rutherford County gal all grown up)

My husband is also diabetic. We really don't like the taste of Splenda, but keep trying. he uses S&L in his coffee but reading about excitotoxins keeps us trying for a different source. Have you ever used whey sweetener? I ordered some whey sweeteners that taste very 'real' and are not chemically derived, just don't see much published EVER about using them.

Another friend here makes phenomenal zucchini relish, you know how plentiful zuc is late summer...i think i will try some of it in the devils.