Whenever I think of Easter, I remember my grandmother. She prepared all sorts of goodies at every feast, and she also used to paint red eggs with onion leaves.

If in the old days, in my childhood during the Ceausescu era, I remember all too well the Gallus paint with which my mother, with the help of my sister and me, used to paint Easter eggs – those were almost magical moments for a child like me – now, we are used to colouring eggs with onion leaves. And we’ve been doing it for years, which doesn’t change the magic of the moment.

I love to dye eggs naturally, year after year looking for the best ways to introduce even more plant-based hues to our holiday table. That’s how I ended up with eggs dyed with red cabbage, turmeric or beetroot, black tea and even spinach.

But because red eggs are representative of the feast of the Resurrection, we will focus our attention on them today.

You need:

*white eggs

*common eggs (reddish)

*a handful of red onion leaves

*a handful of yellow onion leaves

*7 black tea bags

*1 tablespoon of white vinegar for each pan you paint in

*approximately two litres of water per pan

Method

1.Wash the eggs well and dry them

2.Pour hot water into three saucepans and put yellow onion leaves in one, red onion leaves in the 2nd and black tea bags in the 3rd. Let it all boil, add 1 tablespoon of vinegar to each pan and place the uncooked eggs in the pans, depending on how you want to dye them

3.So, if you put white eggs in the pot with red onion leaves, you will get a very dark crimson, even brown

4.If you put white eggs in the bowl with yellow onion leaves, you will get a not very interesting orangey yellow.

5.More special is the shade obtained by the combination of white eggs dyed in black tea

6.An interesting red will come out if you combine normal (reddish) chicken eggs with red onions, the most beautiful and true red will come out if you put normal (reddish) eggs in the pot where you boil the yellow onion leaves.

7.However you decide to combine them, after boiling the eggs, in the pots with onion leaves and black tea, let them boil for about 10 minutes, then remove them to a dish with paper towels.

8.To give them a shine while the eggs are hot, brush them with sunflower oil using a napkin