Chinese Tea Eggs (Chinese New Year recipe)

Tea Eggs or Soy eggs(“dizef roti”) are very popular in Mauritius. Tea eggs come from China, where they can be eaten as snacks, or as accompaniment to other dishes like jook (rice porridge). The original tea eggs recipe uses soy sauce, black tea leaves (especially pu’er tea) and various spices like cinnamon, star anise, fennel seeds, cloves, Szechuan peppercorns, liquorice, mandarin peels. However, some tea eggs recipes do not require all of the above ingredients and the chinese five-spice powder can be used to replace many of the spices needed. This chinese egg recipe is the quick way of making tea eggs, where the eggs are first boiled, then the shells removed and simmered in the spiced liquid.  This type of Chinese tea eggs are called 滷蛋, while the recipe using black tea calls the eggs 茶叶蛋. Thanks to my chinese friend Ziyu for pointing this out to me! For other Chinese New Year Recipes, you can check out these: Mauritian-Chinese fried noodles, Sweet and Sour Pork Meatballs, Spring Rolls, Orange Chicken in a sauce, Vegetarian potstickers, Chinese dumplings with chicken.

(Complete list of Chinese New Year Recipes)

Chinese Tea Eggs recipe (Chinese New Year recipe)

Ingredients:
10 boiled eggs
1 tbsp chinese 5 spices
1 tbsp cooking oil
1 tbsp soya sauce
300 ml cooking wine

Steps:
1. Remove the shells from the boiled eggs.
2. Put all ingredients to simmer in a pot about 20 minutes.
3. The longer time you let the eggs in the mixture, the darker in color they will become.