Addictive Deviled Eggs

I honestly don’t get compulsive about food usually. I have pretty good willpower and can stop at a reasonable portion with most foods. But…there’s something about deviled eggs. I’m always thrilled to see them at a party, and often have to go into the other room to stop eating them. They are such perfect finger food. And the creamy yolk and mayo yumminess. I mean, who’s ever said, “I just can’t stop eating these cold hard boiled eggs.”? No one. But deviled eggs…?

But add some spices and mayo, and you’ve got yourself a ready-made party. So, the other morning Marc and I were sitting in bed, hemming and hawing about what to bring to a monthly gathering of friends around a campfire the next night, and could not come up with something that would be pretty enough for a blog post, AND great party food, AND easy to make a bunch of. (I admit it, I’m a food blog geek now…my husband is so patient) When we landed on deviled eggs, I got giddy at the idea of making them (never mind the fact that I made them earlier that week, in our egg-stravaganza since the eggless part of our household was on the other side of the continent for two weeks, but I digress)

I often make deviled eggs with fresh dill, but I have recently converted to using curry powder instead. Then I remembered we had celery in the fridge that would happily play a part in this egg-stravaganza. Also my very generous friend Corie, whose beaded ornament I posted here, gave us some delicious Penzey’s smoked paprika a while back. The smokiness of the paprika harmonizes perfectly with the flavorful spices in the curry powder.

You can certainly just spoon the filling into the egg white cavities, but for giggles, I piped it with a make-shift pastry bag. I just spooned the filling into a zip top bag, zipped it closed, cut off one corner and piped it in. Easy, and a little cuter.

So, here is my recipe for Addictive Deviled Eggs. As usual, please incorporate as many organic/local/sustainable ingredients as you can.
12 eggs
1 tsp. dijon mustard
Approx. 1/2 C. mayo (depends on how firm or creamy you want the end result)
1 Tbs. curry powder
1 small celery stalk, very finely minced
salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
smoked paprika sprinkled to finish

There are many methods, but my favorite for hard boiling eggs, is to put them in a pot with cold water, bring them up to a boil, boil for about 5 minutes, then turn off the heat, and let them sit in the hot water for 20 minutes.

Run cold water over them to cool them off, then peel the eggs and cut them in half. Pop the yolks into a bowl, and add the mayo.

I like to mash the yolks and mayo with a fork to get a relatively smooth filling, then I mix in the celery, curry powder and pepper. Depending on the saltiness of your mayo and curry powder, you may or may not need to add salt, but taste it, and adjust as you need to. Pipe or spoon the filling in, garnish with a few pinches of smoked paprika, and you have yourself an addictive (but real food) treat for all those holiday pot lucks coming up.