Recipe: Crackled Deviled eggs

Pinterest is full of great ideas. I orginally found a picture of painted deviled eggs and then I came across a picture of crackled eggs and I decided to combine the two for a beautiful and fun to make appetizer. To make the process easier I'm splitting the recipe into 2 parts. The hard boiling and crackling section and then the coloring and deviling section.  It's pretty simple.

Beautiful Crackled Deviled Eggs

Crackled Eggs
12 eggs
food coloring
apple cider vinegar (any clear vinegar will do)
4 sealable plastic baggies

Fill up a large saucepan half way with water and gently add the eggs. Make sure the eggs are covered by at least an inch of water. If you want, you can add a teaspoon of vinegar to the water (I didn't do it but it should help contain egg whites from leaking out if any of the shells crack while cooking). Add a pinch of salt to the water and bring to a boil. Once boiling, cook for about 10 minutes for the perfect hard boil. Drain hot water from the pan and run cold water over the eggs. (If you crack the eggs while their cooling, it will make it easier to peel later on). Let sit in the cool water for a few minutes.
Crack your eggs without peeling them. Put three eggs in each plastic bag and squirt a couple drops of food coloring in as well. Since I was making deviled eggs I didn't use the yellow food coloring. I tried to make purple but failed rather miserably. I think I need to practice my color mixing skills.
Once the eggs and dye are in place, add a few drops of apple cider vinegar to help set the color. Fill each bag with water. Leave the eggs in the bags for about a half an hour.
Drain the bags. I poured the color into red solo cups to dye eggs later on.
Peel the eggs carefully and you have some beautiful crackled eggs that you can either serve as is or as deviled eggs.  Some of my eggs didn't crackle as well as others, so next time I think I'll make sure they're evenly cracked all around.

I also kept the shells because they look beautiful when they dry. I used them to make a center piece as suggested by Kim on Mommysavers. It looked really awesome.

The crackled egg shells fresh out of the dye

My Easter Center Piece using plastic eggs and egg shells

Colored Deviled Eggs
12 hard boiled eggs (in this case, crackled eggs)
2 teaspoons dijon mustard
1/3 cup light mayo
1 tbsp finely grated onion
cayenne pepper to taste
Salt and pepper
Paprika

Using a sharp knife, slice each egg in half lengthwise. Gently remove the yolk halves and place in a small bowl. If you like the final result of your crackle, you can place the whites onto a serving platter at this point.

I, however, decided to be more complicated. I dipped the eggs back into the food coloring. The crackle gets emphasized with further dye and the whites lose all the white color so the yellow yolks will pop beautifully. It also screamed Easter to me.

With a fork mash the yolks, mayo, mustard, onion, and cayenne. You can add a little more mayo if your mixture is looking a little dry. Add a dash of salt and pepper.
At this point you can either simply spoon the yolk mixture into egg white halves or you can put the mixture into a plastic baggie. Cut one corner of the bag and use like a pastry bag to beautifully fill the egg whites.
Sprinkle with paprika and serve.