When our winemaker isn’t busy fermenting grape juice, he’s busy fermenting everything else: sourdough, kefir, cheese, sauerkraut, carrots, and even our farm eggs! “Wild” or Lacto fermentation is a food preservation process using a salt-water brine. Lactobacillus bacteria grow in the anerobic environment of the brine filled jar, and feed on starches in the food to create lactic acid, which preserves the food naturally. Fermented foods can be easier for our bodies to digest and absorb valuable nutrients and are full of beneficial microbes for our gut health.

We use a half-gallon canning jar and make over a dozen eggs for our house. This recipe is for a 32-oz canning jar. You can choose different herbs, spices, and vegetables to add to the jar and flavor your fermented eggs. Spicy people can add hot peppers. We’ve experimented with adding carrots and dill from the garden, and adding very thinly sliced red beets will color your eggs a pretty magenta hue.

Matt's Fermented Hard-Boiled Eggs Compton Wines

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Best Method for boiling eggs:

  1. Be sure the fresh eggs are at room temperature.
  2. Boil water – then add eggs and boil for 8 minutes.
  3. Turn off the burner and let sit for 3 minutes.
  4. Put eggs in an ice water bath until you can handle them. Crack eggs on the bottom of the egg and peel.
– DOWNLOAD RECIPE PDF –

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Ingredients

Hard-boiled eggs: 6-12, peeled
Water: 2 cups of non-chlorinated water – well water or filtered water is best
Salt: 3 tablespoons non-iodized, unrefined salt, such as sea salt or kosher salt
Flavorings (optional, and always fun to try different herbs):
2- 3 cloves of garlic (smashed, leave skin on)
Large sprig of rosemary, dry or fresh
Handful of chives (it is chive season, we just grabbed a bunch from the garden)
1-2 bay leaves
Handful of thyme
Handful of oregano
1 teaspoon of peppercorn
An optional dash of whey, kefir, or sauerkraut juice to add to the liquid will help the good bacteria thrive, which is great for your gut microbiome.

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Instructions

Notes On Salt: For different jar sizes, or just convenience, you can premix a 3% salt solution to add to your ferment jar. This is a ratio of about 3 Tablespoons of salt to 1 liter of water. Or to really be precise: dissolve 30 grams of non-iodized salt into 1 liter (1000 grams) of water.

Invest in good quality salts. Refined table salts have anti-caking agents and iodine added which inhibits fermentation. Trace minerals in unrefined salt can encourage a healthy fermentation environment and growth of beneficial gut microbes

Method

  1. Start with a clean widemouth 32-oz canning jar. Put your crushed garlic on the bottom of the jar.
  2. Put your small herbs on the bottom of the jar including the leaves and stems. It’s all got flavor.
  3. Place your hard-boiled eggs in the jar. We can fit 6-12 eggs in a 32-oz jar.
  4. Slide your larger herbs down the side of the eggs between the glass jar and the eggs. You can also put some in the middle of the eggs. This is where you can make the jar look pretty to enjoy looking at it on your kitchen counter while the eggs ferment.
  5. Pour filtered water into the jar, leaving a little space at the top of the jar to add 3 Tablespoons of salt. Or use a premixed 3% salt to water solution for any size jar that you choose.
  6. Be sure the eggs are fully submerged. Add more water if needed to be sure everything is wet. You can also get a Fermentation Glass Weight to put on top of the jar.
  7. Add a lid to the top of the jar, not too tight. Even if you use a fermentation weight, still add a lid.
  8. Shake up the jar and place it on the kitchen counter out of the sunlight for 2 to 3 days. Give it a shake when you pass by. After 2-3 days, refrigerate and eat some tasty eggs.
  9. You may notice cloudiness in the water towards the end of the fermentation process. That is all the healthy microbes that you have created with lacto fermentation.
  10. Your fermented eggs will stay good in the fridge for up to 2 weeks.