Pickled eggs: take 2

Well I was really excited about trying the pickled eggs from this entry. In fact, a couple of us were and we made a night of it. Then we were all rewarded with sharp vinagre punches to the mouth.

I have big dreams of a jar reading "Monch's eggs" sitting on the counter of a local pub, maybe my own some day, so I'm not giving up yet. I kind of got excited and put too much planning into the flavours, and skipped maybe the most important factor: The pickling liquid.

My original research on pickling eggs resulted in a pretty simple recipe that only used spices and vinagre, but it also called for storing the eggs outside of the fridge for a good month. I stored mine in the fridge so maybe they didn't benefit from the time on the shelf that perhaps mellows them out a little.

At any rate, I don't have any interest in playing around in those danger zones of bacteria growth just yet - I want to get some training, or at least some more books before I put myself or anyone at risk. So I'm trying them again in the fridge, but this time using half vinagre, and half water for the liquid.

For flavours I'm going with the Tavern Style from last entry but with the addition of pickling spice, salt, and sugar, and then I'm kind of messing around with another one:

Tavern style: peppercorns, chili flakes, pickling spice (looks like mostly cardamon seeds and bay leaf to me), salt, and sugar. 

Senior Muchacho's eggs: My favourite habanero hot sauce at the moment: Mary Sharp's Habanero Hot Sauce, cilantro and a lime.

Not idea how this is going to turn out. I'm expecting the first to be the best, but also too safe for "Monch's eggs".

I also kind of realized after the fact that things tend to get hotter as they pickle, or maybe the capsicum can just penetrate deeper into the eggs and then there is no relief: Instead of some heat then the rich protein of the egg cutting it a little, its just a denser form of the heat. Anyways, I put twice as much hot sauce in as what I originally thought would be a reasonable amount and I have a feeling this one is going to hurt.

I'm going to let these sit for a while until my good bud (and pickled egg fan) gets back to town. For now enjoy the pics and I'll write something up again soon.