How To Dye Eggs Naturally With Everyday Ingredients

Heather Dessinger

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How To Dye Easter Eggs Naturally With Everyday Ingredients

When I compiled a list of natural Easter egg dyes to try with my kids years ago, hibiscus was said to make a beautiful pink. However, when I actually tested it the egg turned dark green. Oops. Some of the other suggestions didn’t work at alland some were just meh. (I’m looking at you lemon peels.)

That’s why after experimenting with everything from carrots and yellow onion skins to raspberries and grape juice, I’ve compiled a list of ingredients that consistently yield beautiful, vibrant colors. You’ll find them below along with the specific recipes I used.

Also, when the hunt is over, you can use the eggs to make deviled eggs or this homestyle potato salad recipe with bacon.

But first, you might be wondering…

Why not use food coloring?

When I was a kid, I vividly remember eating hard boiled eggs that were blue, red, and yellow. The dye tabs we’d used weren’t intended to soak through, but they did, and that’s just one of the reasons I choose a natural approach.

  • As covered in this post, food dyes have been linked to attention and behavioral problems in children, certain types of cancer, and other problems.
  • The U.S. isn’t as stringent as Europe in regulating food dyes. They require foods which contain dyes to come with warning labels and have banned many of the ones that are still in use within the United States.
  • Some children are very sensitive, even in very small amounts.

If you’d like to take a deep dive into the health effects of each individual dye, I recommend the Center for Science in the Public Interest’s 68 page report, Food Dyes: A Rainbow of Risks.

How To Dye Easter Eggs Naturally

How To Dye Easter Eggs Naturally

Below you’ll find my approach for creating beautiful, vibrant colors using everyday ingredients. The instructions are divided into four sections:

  • Individual recipes for different colors of dye
  • My three step-process for coloring Easter eggs, which includes how to make the dye, how to prepare the eggs, and instructions for using the dye
  • Answers to frequently asked questions
  • Where to buy natural Easter egg dye if you don’t want to make your own
homemade-easter-egg-dye-beets

To Dye Easter Eggs Pink, You’ll Need:

  • 2 cups water
  • 2 cups peeled, grated beets
  • 1-2 tablespoons white vinegar

See the “Three-Step Process for Dyeing Easter Eggs Naturally” section below for specific instructions on how to make the dye bath, prepare the hard boiled eggs, and then color the eggs.

natural-easter-egg-dye-onion

To Dye Easter Eggs Orange, You’ll Need:

  • 2 cups yellow onion skins
  • Enough water to cover skins by 1 inch
  • 1-2 tablespoons white vinegar

Scroll down to the “Three-Step Process for Dyeing Easter Eggs Naturally” section below for detailed instructions.

natural-easter-egg-dye-turmeric

To Dye Easter Eggs Yellow, You’ll Need:

  • 2 cups water
  • 1 tablespoon turmeric
  • 2 tablespoons vinegar

This turmeric dye creates a vibrant yellow on white eggs and a deep gold on brown ones.

Other options: Strongly brewed chamomile tea creates a soft yellow.

See the “Three-Step Process for Dyeing Easter Eggs Naturally” section below for step-by-step instructions.

natural-easter-egg-dye-purple-cabbage

To Dye Easter Eggs Green or Blue, You’ll Need:

  • 2 cups shredded purple cabbage (sometimes called red cabbage)
  • Enough water to cover cabbage by 1 inch
  • 1-2 tablespoons vinegar

Brown eggs will turn green and white eggs will turn blue.

Other options: Strongly brewed hibiscus tea (with one tablespoon vinegar per cup) will create the dark green pictured in the photo at the top. Blueberries will create a slightly marbled blue color.

Step-by-step instructions can be found in the “Three-Step Process for Dyeing Easter Eggs Naturally” section below.

To Make Purple Easter Egg Dye, You’ll Need:

When using kvass no additional dye preparation is needed, so in the instructions below you can skip the “Three-Step Process for Dyeing Easter Eggs Naturally” section and move straight to “Directions for Boiling & Coloring The Eggs”

Natural Easter Egg Dye Recipes
naturally colored Easter eggs
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5 from 1 vote

How to Dye Easter Eggs Naturally in Three Steps

After experimenting with everything from lemon peels and carrots to raspberries and grape juice, I’ve figured out which ingredients consistently yield beautiful, vibrant colors. Here are the natural egg dye ingredients that work.
Calories
Author Heather Dessinger

Equipment

  • pots (3-5)
  • small bowls or mason jars (order mason jars here)

Ingredients

  • Natural dye materials (shredded beets, turmeric, etc)
  • Filtered water
  • 1 – 2 tbsp vinegar (per dye color)
  • eggs (however many you want to make)
  • Coconut or olive oil  (optional – for adding luster to eggs)

Instructions

Making Easter Egg Dye

  • Bring  the dye matter (cabbage, turmeric, etc.) and water to a boil. Turn heat down to low and simmer, covered, for 15-60 minutes until desired color is reached. Keep in mind that the eggs will be several shades lighter so it’s best to go for deep, rich hues.
  • Remove the egg dye from heat and let it cool to room temperature.
  • Pour the dye through a mesh strainer into bowls/mason jars and add 1 tablespoon of vinegar for each cup of dye liquid.
  • Add hard boiled eggs to the dye and place them in the fridge until the desired color is reached. I started mine in the early afternoon and let them infuse overnight.

Boiling the Eggs

  • Add the eggs to a medium pot and cover them with cold water. Bring the water to a hard boil, then turn off the heat and cover the pot. After 10 minutes, place the eggs in a bowl of cold water and let them sit until they’re cool to the touch.
  • Drain the bowl and replace with warm, soapy water  – I use non-toxic castile soap. Gently rub the eggs with a washcloth or your thumb to remove oils that prohibit the natural dyes from adhering effectively to the egg shell.

Dyeing The Eggs

  • Lower the eggs into the dye and place them in the fridge. Soak until your desired color is reached. (We usually soak ours overnight.)
  • When the eggs are ready scoop them out with a slotted spoon and place them on a drying rack or an upside down egg carton.
  • Naturally-dyed eggs have a matte finish. If you’d like to add a little luster, rub with a drop or two of coconut or olive oil.

Need a quicker and easier option?

If you want to make naturally-dyed eggs without spending extra time boiling fruits and veggies, this kit looks like a good option. The dyes are made from fruits, herbs and veggies – all you need to add is hot water.

It may be a good idea to order soon just to make sure it arrives on time.

Frequently Asked Questions

Below are the most common questions I’ve received since first posting this tutorial. If you have one I haven’t answered yet please let me know!

Can these natural egg dyes be stored overnight and used the next day?

Yep!

Can I draw on the eggs with a wax crayon before dyeing them?

We haven’t tried this but I don’t see a reason not to as long as the crayons are non-toxic.

Do natural dyes change the flavor of the eggs?

Nope!

What do you think about coloring Easter eggs with silk?

Over the past few years of I’ve received several questions about whether dyeing eggs with men’s silk ties is safe. Although silk dyed eggs are beautiful and silk is definitely natural, some of the dyes used to color ties are toxic.

Scientific American recommends wearing a mask or working in a well-ventilated area while making them, and advises against eating them.

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About HEATHER

Heather is a holistic health educator, herbalist, DIYer, Lyme and mold warrior. Since founding Mommypotamus.com in 2009, Heather has been taking complicated health research and making it easy to understand. She shares tested natural recipes and herbal remedies with millions of naturally minded mamas around the world. 

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99 thoughts on “How To Dye Eggs Naturally With Everyday Ingredients”

  1. have always wanted to do these. just so expensive,but like anything natural i guess. par for the course of health 🙂

    Reply
    • How long would these eggs last? I’d like to make them with my son a couple days before Easter, and then try making the pesto egg recipe on Easter. Would they last in the fridge, or are they best eaten the same day? Thank you!

      Reply
  2. We do this every year and LOVE it. The only thing is that it can be tough to find white eggs that are pasture-raised in my area, and dying brown eggs just makes them a slightly different shade of brown. Still loads of fun.

    Reply
  3. Meg Bailey Gustafson- I was worried about the cost too, but a deep blue dye made from purple cabbage is fairly inexpensive and you can use scraps from yellow/red onion and less than a tablespoon of turmeric for other gorgeous hues. It’s not as cheap as Paas dye, but it’s definitely doable with a little planning!

    Reply
    • We’ve been doing the onion skin eggs for decades. You can go to a local grocery a few weeks ahead and ask them to put the onion skins aside for you. Or just gather them up in a bag every week. To get a nice dark brown (it will look like a wood egg), you need a lot of skins. We simmer the onion skins and eggs at the same time, instead of steeping pre boiled eggs.

      Reply
  4. I was just telling my daughter, (as I was pouring some beet kvass) that her Great G-pa always used beets to color eggs!! This will be so fun! Thanks for sharing! Although, as we are preparing our dinners, one can save the onion peels or whatnot and keep adding to the certain color jar as you go up until Easter! That way you wont be going out to get EVERYTHING at once!

    Reply
  5. The natural colors look so much more vibrant and beautiful than store bought dyes! I was thinking about switching to natual dyes and just hadn’t looked up directions yet so thank you very much!

    Reply
  6. They’ll love it, LeeandMaia Forde! My daughter was so excited to eat them this morning, which I considered a nice side benefit 🙂

    Reply
    • I just tried brewing a cup of hibiscus tea and adding vinegar to a portion of it and baking soda to another portion. The portion with the vinegar didn’t change colors and the one with the baking soda turned grey. Any suggestions on how to achieve the dark green?

      Reply
  7. Don’t get me wrong – I was just reacting to the way that was presented. I choose natural over artificial, but usually not out of fearful reasons.

    Reply
  8. Ok, I think it get it now Claudia Ritter.For what it’s worth, all I meant is that there are fun and vibrant dye alternatives to what we grew up with 🙂

    Reply
  9. My husband and I were just talking about trying to color eggs naturally with our 2-year-old, since this year she is old enough to dye eggs. Your post will save us lots of experimentation. Thanks:-)

    Reply
  10. I love this idea! I’m thinking I’ll have to try these as easter gets closer. I stopped dying eggs years ago and haven’t tried natural dying. I must give this a try now that I have a little toddler running around.

    Reply
  11. The colors are so much more beautiful than the neon colors from the tabs : )

    I can’t wait to try my own this year!

    Reply
  12. Such a great post, Heather! I’m sharing it on my real food meal plan over at The Better Mom! Hope this sends many new friends your way! Lots of blessings to you for a Happy Good Friday and Easter Sunday, Kelly

    Reply
  13. Oh rad! I love these ideas, I’m sure you can use most of these natural items for dying food too. I shared this post on my Facebook. : )

    Reply
  14. Slightly off topic.. I’m going to use a similar method to dye some scarves I’m making, and wondering how I could accomplish a grey color. Activated charcoal maybe?

    Reply
    • Charcoal won’t do anything to fabric. I’ve made a bluish gray using black beans – soak the beans overnight, strain the beans out (and cook them up into your favorite recipe!). Add your fabric to the juice and simmer until it’s the color you want. (if you don’t use any heat you can get a vibrant blue)

      Other ways to get gray is to use more than one dye that are opposite the color wheel. Like a purple dye and a green dye, or blue and brown. Dye the cloth one color, then the other.

      Reply
  15. Finally worked up the courage to dye eggs with my 17mo and 3 yo. WOW I dont remember the chemical dyes even being so vibrant. I love the purple from the beet kvass, blue from the red cabbage, yellow from turmeric, and orange from yellow onions.

    Reply
  16. I just did mine, and turmeric and red cabbage together make a pretty green, even though the dye looks just kind of maroon when you mix them. I also tried to get red with cranberries and it did not make them red, instead they became speckled gray.

    Reply
  17. Oh I love how your dark grape colored ones turned out! I didn’t do blueberries this year but I was happy with my rainbow from the turmeric, beets, onions and cabbage. 🙂

    Reply
  18. Mariya Kudyakova, April Shaner, Stefani Williamson Gentry This is just what we were talking about the other night!

    Reply
  19. Great tips, thank you!
    Another trick my mother-in-law does is to wrap an egg in an old sheer nylon sock or cut -off foot of pantyhose, stick some small leaves (clover or similar) onto the egg, knot tightly and then dye the egg. The shape of the leaf will stay on the eggshell and give it an extra nice pattern.

    Reply
  20. Love this idea! My little is only 4 months so we won’t be dying eggs this year, but probably next!
    The only thing about this that makes me nervous is the washing of the eggs. I know you don’t do it until after they’re boiled, but I think I would opt to lightly sand the shells with a fine grit paper.

    Reply
  21. I’m so surprised by the onion and cabbage! Beautiful! I’ve been experimenting with natural dyes for icing for sugar cookies and still trying to figure out a blue!

    Reply
  22. What a fabulous post! I would’ve loved this option when I did eggs years ago but I didn’t consider it then. I found the link to this article on Organic Week, very cool (if I could do a thumbs up you could see, I would!)

    Reply
  23. Hi! thanks for this! just wondering, is there a typo in the Pink dye? Did you use onion peels AND beets together, or just beets? >> Above it says “Two cups water + two cups peeled, grated beets + vinegar (1 tablespoon per cup of liquid that remains after you simmer the ****ONION PEELS**** and water)”

    Reply
    • OOPS! Yes, that’s a type. It should say “after you simmer the shredded beet and water.” Thanks so much for pointing that out. I’m correcting it now!

      Reply
  24. Can those dyes be stored overnight in a fridge and used next day? In other words, do they need to be freshly made in order for them to work?

    Reply
    • Yes, they can be stored overnight. However, in my experience the eggs have the most brilliant color if they are allowed to sit overnight so I’d put the eggs in, too 🙂

      Reply
  25. You don’t need vinegar, especially not for onions or turmeric. Vinegar only changes the color of cabbage. (baking soda shifts it the other way). Vinegar is a necessary ingredient for artificial food dyes, and because most people come from dyeing with the artificial colors, they get confused about the need for vinegar. It’s not at all necessary for natural dyes, and can in fact sometimes make the color weaker.

    Reply
  26. Nice ideas but blasphemy for the Abe Lincoln quote…Since our country is trying to rewrite history- hoping that a millennial will not believe that quote. More needed to be said to put it into context.
    Too many sound bites sent out over the internet. Be careful of what your children read…and believe. Try not to mix cooking with historical/political humor…if that was your intent…

    Reply
    • If you wanted or needed advice from strangers, Heather, my own would be to go ahead and mix cooking and historical or political humor any time you feel like it! It’s your blog! The quote makes me laugh. 🙂

      Reply
    • Any REASONABLE person, even a child, Anita, should realize that it couldn’t POSSIBLY be a Lincoln quote. The Internet didn’t exist until the last quarter or so of the 20th century. You are far too serious. Get over yourself!

      Annie’s right, Heather. It’s your blog … Your sense of humour. Keep it up, Mommypotamus! You’re doing great!

      Reply
    • Sheri, My four year old granddaughter cracked over a dozen while coloring eggs yesterday, and the colors on the egg whites were amazing! We used traditional food coloring this year, so when we go natural dyes next year there may be some concern over getting the flavor/smell of the dye in the eggs. While Joslyn was coloring with dye, my children and I were trying the silk tie squares tied on and simmered for 30 minutes method. some came out okay, some not very vivid. This is another option you may want to try. I believe the website was Salt that listed the instructions.

      Reply
  27. Love this! We did onion skin dyed eggs this year. We wrapped them in the skins and boiled them which gave a neat marbled look. We will have to try out some of the other colors! Who says egg dying is only for Easter?! 😉

    Reply
  28. What a topical post! Thanks so much! I trust your suggestions! How can I produce red dye? Would mixing the dyes from beet and turmeric be a good idea?

    Reply
  29. Oh my goodness! These are so cute! I love this idea! I have been trying to find a way to do this without toxic dye! Thank you!

    Reply
    • You could try making the dyes and then freezing them and see how that works, but I wouldn’t recommend keeping them in the fridge that long as they may go bad.

      Reply
  30. Can I draw on the eggs with a wax crayon before dying them overnight, or will the wax dissipate from being in the water so long?

    Reply
  31. What a great idea! Especially since we are getting away from harmful dyes! Natural is always the best way to go. Thank you for the post!

    Reply
  32. I heard that adding salt helps make the dye darker. Have you tried this? We only have brown eggs. Is there a color that works on them?

    Reply
  33. Do you find that that the settling of the turmeric affected the egg color? Mine settled to the bottom. But I see that one of your yellow eggs is much lighter than the other and am wondering if that’s because of the settling?

    Reply
  34. I’m wondering how your Hibiscus egg turned out green? My hibiscus tea is pink, and with a double amount simmered on the stove it is a dark fuschia. Did I miss something? I was counting on the beet for pink.

    Reply
      • We tried this out this year, and hibiscus turned our eggs dark blue! It might have been a bit too acidic though, as the shell became a bit mottled and bubbled. The kids thought it was great – they called them dragon eggs.

        Reply
  35. I’m loving your DIY articles, Heather. I’ve been interested in natural dye alternatives for a while now. I recently found a really interesting one and I was wondering if you have any experience with using avocado peel and pits for dyeing. I heard it gives a beautiful pinkish color.

    Reply
  36. Hi! I signed up for your newsletter and I’m still not seeing the printable guide. Please help! I’m excited to modify these recipes to use my instant pot for the dye making!

    Reply
  37. For several generations now my family has peeled the eggs and then dyed them. The eggs are then made into deviled eggs and used in potato salad. It makes the deviled eggs and potato salad fun and colorful. Can you peel and then dye the eggs with the natural dyes? Will it change the flavor of the eggs?

    Reply
  38. A student in my class is allergic to eggs, so using eggs is a no-go. would these recipes work for a watercolor paint look on paper?

    Reply
  39. 5 stars
    my mom boils eggs directly with the onlion peels and reaches her amazing color immediately….is this an option with your other ingredients too? i don’t have time to soak overnight. also, did you use white or brown eggs?

    Reply
  40. Making my colors now .
    May I know what the added vinegar does ?
    Should you always add the foods to leach color to boiling water or will hot water bring enough of the desired color ?
    Thank you for the fantastic post !
    Happy Easter!!

    Reply
  41. I did this with my 2nd grade classroom several years ago! Great fun…except for a little odor from one of the ingredients…but my end of the hall was used to unusual fun. Anyway we watched a short segment of a Martha Stewart Cooking show doing this and read the book from Patricia Polacco, Rechenka’s Eggs. Yes, it was a few years ago…but great fun!

    Reply
  42. Thanks so much! This all looks amazing, can’t wait to try them out! I was curious to get your opinion, do you think these colors would work to make tie-died shirts?

    Reply
  43. Just wondering if anyone has tried, AFTER hard boiling the eggs, cracking the skins to make a marbled egg effect?
    I think it would look rather interesting!

    Reply
  44. Hi all,
    In my culture we save the egg shells from our day to day use to prepare and fill with confetti and other fun little things inside for Easter.
    Growing up I remember I would dye them with my grandmother and cousins but I’m 99% sure those weren’t exactly natural colors. Now that we have a new generation, I want to make sure they have the same memories but with safer ingredients.
    Most of the posts I have seen about egg dyeing are on hard boiled eggs so I just want to know if anyone else knows if there is a difference if only dyeing the egg shells vs the whole egg

    I hope to hear some feedback since Easter is just around the corner ♥
    Thanks in advance!

    Reply