Daring Cooks November Challenge

First things first - an apology and excuses for lack of posting recently. Two reasons - I just ran a half marathon, so the last few weeks of training didn't leave much energy for cooking anything fancy, and also I've been sewing a lot. Nothing's finished and worth a post yet, but expect lots of sewing posts coming up.

Anyway, onto the Daring Cooks Challenge. This month's challenge was an intriguing one: cooking with tea.

I chose to make Chinese Tea Eggs - a recipe I have often flicked past in my Asian recipe book but never made. They turn out quite pretty with their marbeled whites.



The method was simple but it was quite a long process (although most of the time it doesn't really need any attention). The taste was interesting and less subtle than I had expected, but as you can see from the snap above one egg did split and that was the one I ate - so it may have been a little stronger flavoured than a perfect one would have been. Lightly flavoured with soy, tea, and star anise this was a novelty, and it was pretty good with the crab cakes and peas I paired it with. I'm not sure I'll be repeating this recipe to be honest - its an awfully long process for a hard boiled egg!

Here's the method if you fancy having a try:

Chinese Tea Eggs

2 or more eggs
30ml dark soy sauce
1/2 star anise
2 tea bags
1/2 teaspoon salt

Place the eggs in cold water, bring to the boil and simmer for 20 minutes. Drain, rinse in cold water and leave in cold water until cold. Roll the eggs so that the shells crack but don't break.
Add the soy, salt, tea bags, and star anise to the water. Replace the eggs and bring to the boil again, cover the pan and turn the heat down. Simmer for 1 1/2 - 2 hours then remove from the heat and allow to cool in the cooking liquid.

Shell immediately before eating, which its best to do within 24 hours.


Sarah from Simply Cooked was our November Daring Cooks’ hostess and she challenged us to create something truly unique in both taste and technique! We learned how to cook using tea with recipes from Tea Cookbook by Tonia George and The New Tea Book by Sara Perry.