She
has credentialed subject matter experts to back her up. One is Liz Williams,
the director of the New Orleans-based Southern Food and Beverage Museum. When
Williams turned 21, her mother marked her daughter’s adulthood by giving her a
deviled egg plate and saying: “You can’t entertain without one of these.”
Debbie
Moose, a food writer and author in Raleigh, shared her mother’s advice: “There
are two things that a Southern woman always got for wedding presents: a
hand-crank ice cream maker and a deviled egg plate.”
Susan
Perry of Durham, an egg plate collector, told Weigl she gives egg plates as
gifts to newborn girls because she believes all Southern women should have one.
“Deviled eggs are the first thing to go at a party,” Perry says. “So, you
better have an attractive empty plate.”
On
assignment for History.com, Laura Schumm determined the origin of “modern-day
deviled eggs – those classic creamy concoctions – dates back to ancient Rome.”
“Around
61 A.D., eggs were boiled, seasoned with spicy sauces and then typically served
at the beginning of a meal as a first course,” Schumm reported.
“The
first known printed mention of ‘devil’ as a culinary term appeared in Great
Britain in 1786, in reference to dishes including hot ingredients or those that
were highly seasoned. By 1800, ‘deviling’ described the process of making food
spicy.
“But
in some parts of the world,” Schumm said, “the popular egg hors d’oeuvres are
referred to as mimosa eggs, stuffed eggs or dressed eggs.”
She
noted that salad eggs is the term frequently used at church functions in the
United States to avoid any association with Satan.
According
to Schumm, the classic version of deviled eggs is now widely considered to
include a mixture of mashed up egg yolks and whites, mayonnaise and mustard, “but
professional chefs and home cooks around the world have experimented with
numerous variations on the filling, including the use of pickle relish (either
dill and sweet), bacon, crab meat”…you name it. Add pepper and hot sauce, if
you care and dare.
A
sprinkle of paprika on the top adds a splash of color.
Presentation
is critical as well as practical.
It
requires an official deviled egg plate, platter or tray…especially when
traveling, so the eggs sit tight in their “depressions” and don’t go sliding
off onto the seat, floor or trunk of the vehicle.
Diana
Bulls, writing for Kings River Life Magazine in Reedley, Calif., said America’s
first true egg plates were produced in the 1930s in popular Depression Glass
Sandwich Patterns.
She
said Duncan & Miller Glass Company in Washington, Pa., most likely made the
earliest egg plates.
Angela
Huston, a columnist with Medina County (Ohio) Life, an online newsletter, offers
her own personal observation:
“Every
time I make deviled eggs, I wonder ‘what were they thinking’? The ubiquitous ‘they’
is whoever designed the plate specifically for serving deviled eggs with 15 neat,
little, oval-shaped slots.
“Anyone
who has ever fixed deviled eggs knows the eggs are cut in half; no matter how
many eggs you cook, the final count will come out to an even number, and 15 is
not an even number.” Dagnabbit.
Huston
continued: “Would it really have been all that difficult for someone with
engineering sense to redesign the plate so it would have an even number of
slots?
Huston
concluded: “I have finally learned to stop fussing. Now, I just eat the darned
extra egg, a necessary sacrifice to have peace of mind — and a properly balanced
plate.”
Marie
Lawrence of Morehead City, N.C., may have the largest egg plate collection in
the United States: 986 as of Palm Sunday 2018. One of the fun things about egg
plates, she said is that there is no uniformity in the number of depressions.
Lawrence
said she has been collecting egg plates for nearly 20 years. They are colorful
and come in a variety of shapes and sizes and many are hand-painted. “Like
flowers, they make you happy,” Lawrence said.
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