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An Easter Egg
Story
BY DANA JACOBI
FOR THE AMERICAN INSTITUTE FOR CANCER RESEARCH |
Easter usually falls around
my birthday, and so Easter eggs have often been part of my birthday
celebrations.
The first Easter eggs I received
as a child were more for show than eating. They consisted of
a hollow white-sugar shell with a sort of plastic “window”
through which you could look inside the egg and see a tiny, three-dimensional
scene from a fairy tale, a ballet, or perhaps the Easter bunny
himself. The outside of the shell was usually decorated, as with
a fancy cake, with piped hardened-icing formed into pastel designs
that made these eggs look like giant bon-bons. Picking off and
eating this irresistible decoration was better, to me, than eating
jelly beans, even if it did spoil the looks of the eggs.
For my birthday parties, my
mother usually boiled dozens of eggs and handed out Easter-egg
kits to kids and parents alike to decorate the eggs. After rubbing
the eggs with a crayon of colorless wax, we dunked the eggs in
liquid dye. The coloring dye was made by dissolving tablets that
came in the kits, plus a little white vinegar, into pots of water.
Dipping eggs first into red, then blue, was how I discovered
the color purple. Better yet were the electric shades of orange
and screaming yellow-green that I created.
I thought eating these eggs
would be fun since the dye even tinted their whites. But my mother
forbad that until the year she discovered how to brew dyes from
onion skins (saved for weeks), frozen blueberries, fresh sage
leaves and the like. The process made a mess, and most of the
colors were too subtle or grayish, but a few produced lovely
results on the outside and eggs she thought were safe to eat.
Our family had many creative
ways to eat those hard-boiled eggs that are still smart, as they
are low in fat and include vegetables, beans, or a whole grain.
One version was an egg curry served over brown rice. We also
ate egg salad made with chopped spinach, scallions, roasted red
peppers and a splash of buttermilk. Deviled eggs were stuffed
with mashed canned tuna in place of the yolks.
This healthful combination
of eggs, white beans and olives has a deliciously Mediterranean
flavor and tastes great on whole-wheat toast with romaine lettuce.
Egg Salad
with White Beans - Makes
4 servings (2 1/2 cups egg salad mixture).
4 hard-cooked eggs
1 cup canned small white beans, rinsed and drained
3 Tbsp. chopped Kalamata olives
2 Tbsp. minced chives
1 tsp. Dijon-style mustard
3 dashes hot pepper sauce, or to taste
1/2 tsp. ground black pepper
8 Boston lettuce leaves
8 slices seedless cucumber, cut diagonally
1 large tomato, cut in 8 wedges
1 Tbsp. fresh lemon juice
1/4 tsp. salt
2 tsp. extra-virgin olive oil
In a mixing bowl, coarsely chop the eggs. Add the beans. Spread
the olives on a paper towel and blot well, then add them to the
salad. Add the chives, mustard, hot sauce and
1/2 teaspoon ground pepper. Using a fork, mix until salad is
well combined.
Arrange 2 lettuce leaves on
each of 4 salad plates. Mound one-fourth of the egg salad in
the center of each plate.
Place the cucumber and tomatoes
in a mixing bowl. In a small bowl, whisk the lemon juice with
1/4 teaspoon salt until the salt dissolves, then whisk in the
oil. Add pepper to taste. Pour the dressing over the vegetables
and toss to coat. Arrange 2 cucumber slices and 2 tomato wedges
on each plate around the salad. Serve immediately.
Per serving: 167 calories, 7 g. total fat (2 g. saturated fat),
14 g. carbohydrate, 10 g. protein, 3 g. dietary fiber, 266 mg.
sodium.
|
|
 “Something Different” is written by Dana Jacobi, author
of 12 Best Foods Cookbook and contributor to AICR’s New
American Plate Cookbook: Recipes for a Healthy Weight and a Healthy
Life.
The American Institute for
Cancer Research (AICR) is
the cancer charity that fosters research on the relationship
of nutrition, physical activity and weight management to cancer
risk, interprets the scientific literature and educates the public
about the results. It has contributed more than $86 million for
innovative research conducted at universities, hospitals and
research centers across the country. AICR has published two landmark
reports that interpret the accumulated research in the field,
and is committed to a process of continuous review. AICR also
provides a wide range of educational programs to help millions
of Americans learn to make dietary changes for lower cancer risk.
Its award-winning New American Plate program is presented in
brochures, seminars and on its website, www.aicr.org. AICR is
a member of the World Cancer Research Fund International. |
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