A week before Easter, your children tried to convince you that they should each decorate a dozen Easter eggs. Feeling festive and knowing the eggs were on sale, you agreed.
Flash-forward to the end of April and Easter residue can be found in countless homes after the holiday is over. Easter basket grass clings to the bottom of socks, earless chocolate bunnies line the kitchen counter and dozens of colorful hardboiled eggs sit in the refrigerator (next to the leftover ham).
If your family has grown tired of the traditional egg salad sandwiches, it’s time to find another way to serve the leftovers. Check out these 12 simple recipes for using up your Easter eggs.
1. Put it in a salad. Dice up and sprinkle on a Caesar salad, quarter long ways for a nice addition to a Cobb salad or slice into coins and add to a spinach salad with bacon and mushrooms.
2. Serve up a batch of baked Scotch eggs. Remove sausage from the casing (Italian, turkey, chicken) and wrap around a peeled egg drenched in flour. Dip sausage covered egg in raw egg and then roll in bread crumbs. Place on a cookie sheet and bake at 375 degrees for 30 to 40 minutes.
3. Create a Mexican breakfast pizza. Using a piece of flatbread as your crust, spread a layer of refried beans and top with chopped green onions, tomatoes, sliced eggs and sprinkle with Chihuahua cheese. Serve cold as breakfast or an appetizer.
4. Serve with pesto. Spread pesto on an English muffin and top with sliced eggs, bacon and tomatoes.
5. Serve your guests a deviled egg appetizer. Add all the ingredients of your normal deviled egg recipe (mayo, mustard, eggs, onions, etc.) to a food processor and blend until smooth. Add sliced jalapenos to give it a little kick. Serve with raw veggies or spicy crackers.
6. Toss together a side dish. Use sliced eggs, cooled red potatoes, dill, radishes, chickpeas and bacon. Dress with a creamy Italian dressing.
7. Make egg calzones with refrigerated pizza dough. Roll out dough and fill with crumbled eggs, sautéed green peppers and onions, cooked spicy sausage and jarred pizza sauce. Fold dough over to create calzone and seal edges with a fork. Bake as directed on pizza dough package.
8. Dish up egg salad with a twist. Instead of combining mayo and yellow mustard with your eggs, try using Greek yogurt and avocados. Blend two avocados with six hard boiled eggs and add enough yogurt to give you the consistency you prefer. Serve in pitas or wheat wraps.
9. Make surprise meatloaf. Add eggs to the middle of your favorite meatloaf recipe. That’s how Mom did it!
10. Mix into tuna salad. Combine one chopped egg for each can or packet of tuna. Mix in 2 to 3 tablespoons of mayo or Greek yogurt per egg/tuna combo. For an added crunch, add celery, onions or diced water chestnuts. Serve on bread or in a cored tomato.
11. Add shrimp. Combine chopped, cooked shrimp with a half cup each of finely chopped red onion, green peppers and celery. Add two chopped eggs, cilantro, Greek yogurt (1/2 to 3/4 cup) and a tablespoon of lime juice.
12. Try a spin on the deviled egg. Add bacon, hot sauce, diced ham, wasabi or exchange BBQ sauce for mustard in your normal recipe.
Pam Molnar is a freelance writer and mother of three. She loves to try new recipes and blogs about them at winea
