Golden Rod Eggs

Last week was Easter. A time with two sides, if you are of a Christian religion. There is the reverent side, where we remember Christ and His sacrifice for us. Suffering for our sins in Gethsemane and dying on the cross to save us. Then the wonderful gift of His resurrection, and giving us the knowledge that there is life after death and that we will all be resurrected one day as well. I am so very grateful for that knowledge. But, there is also the fun side of Easter that involves bunnies, candy and Easter egg hunts. As a child do you remember the excitement of coloring eggs? Creating beautiful and colorful works of art on eggs. It was such a novelty as a child to be able to handle eggs that way. Then when all the eggs were colored, egg hunts were finished and Easter celebrations over, you had a dozen or more eggs just sitting there. Now what? If you're like me you can only eat a very few hard boiled eggs without getting sick of them, let alone a whole farm's worth. Okay, that's an exaggeration, but when you're sick of them and you still have a dozen sitting there it FEELS like a whole farm's worth. To avoid that scenario you can always use this recipe to get rid of lots of eggs at once! Now, this recipe isn't full of exotic flavors by any means, but you can always add things to it if you want. My husband would add a ton of paprika to it if he had his way. Instead we just put the paprika container next to his plate and he can add what he wants to his own food. The kids and I just add salt and pepper to ours and we think it's great that way. It is pretty blah on its own, though. HOWEVER, my kids, who generally would prefer to not eat eggs, especially if they come in any form other than scrambled, actually lament the end of our Easter eggs because they pretty much only get this dish after Easter is over. Well, the older two do. Boy 2 still doesn't eat eggs. Ever. I have a hard time remembering to make this at any other time of the year. I just generally don't boil eggs for anything during the rest of the year so I don't think about this dish. Every year I promise myself that we'll make it more often and every year I forget. Anyway, here is the recipe. I have no idea who to credit for it. I remember my mom making it when I was a child but I have no idea from where (or whom) she got the recipe.

Golden Rod Eggs
(My family of 5 usually do a recipe and a half or double it, depending on how many eggs we have to use up. It reheats well, too, in case you have leftovers.)

6 eggs, boiled until hard
2 Tbsp margarine (or butter)
2 Tbsp flour
2 Cups milk
Toast
Salt
Pepper

Peel the eggs. Split the whites, pull the yokes out and set the yokes aside. Cut the white of the eggs into small pieces. (Or I suppose you could use a food processor as long as you don't end up pureeing them. I've never tried it, though.) In a small bowl, crumble the egg yolks. (You'll only need about half of the yokes for this so eat some of them if you want!)

Prepare the white sauce by melting the butter over medium heat and stirring in the flour. Stir until the butter and flour mixture bubbles. Stir for another 1 - 2 minutes. Have the milk ready or close by since you don't want the flour and butter to get too hot or start to burn while it's unattended. Add the milk to the butter and flour, stirring constantly. If left unattended for even a short amount of time, the sauce WILL start to cook to the bottom of the pan. (A whisk is the best thing to use for this. I love to use my little coiled Pampered Chef whisk for these types of sauce.)

Cook and stir the sauce over medium heat until the sauce thickens. (This could take quite a while depending on whether you've increased the recipe or not.) Once the sauce is thickened, add the egg whites and continue stirring until the egg whites are hot. Remove from heat.

Toast lots of bread. (We usually use an entire loaf of the "cheap" bread; you know the really little loaves that wouldn't make much of a sandwich at all if you folded it in half or cut the crust off.)

To eat: Either leave the piece of toast whole and cut it with a fork or knife, or break the toast into lots of bite size pieces (which my kids prefer). Then pour some of the white sauce with egg whites over the toast (to your preferred amount) and sprinkle with the egg yokes. Sprinkle with as much salt and pepper as you prefer. Or paprika. Or whatever spice you might want to use. Then enjoy!

Hint: I got this hint from a magazine a long time ago and it works pretty well most of the time. If you lightly smack (technical term) a hard boiled egg on the counter or another hard surface and then roll it either on the counter or in your hands, it nicely cracks the rest of the egg and lets the shell come off more easily. No more picking one little piece off after another!