Learning to decorate eggs in the old-fashioned way

BLOOMFIELD, NJ — During the past several years, Van Tassel Funeral Home, located on Belleville Avenue and the longest-established funeral home in Bloomfield, has positioned itself as a community center, offering local residents programs that include chanting, grief counseling, aromatherapy and Pet Memorial Day. On Palm Sunday, March 20, Van Tassel had a European Easter egg decoration class.

The two-hour lesson was taught by Aneta Pierog-Sudol, a native of Poland from the Orava region, an area located in southern Poland. But the method taught by Pierog-Sudol was from the northeastern part of the country where eggs are colored with more variety and intensity.

“We have rocky soil,” she said of Orava. “It is poor. We just boil eggs with the dark brown skins of onions.”
There were about 30 people in attendance for the lesson. They sat at a single table, with a white tablecloth, that ran the length of a room. Three hard-boiled eggs, in paper plates, were at each place. The setting looked like an elegant breakfast except for the several dozen more boiled eggs, in stacked cartons, on a couch, held in reserve.

At each table place, candles burned within holders that melted white wax to clarity. A new, unsharpened pencil was at each place, its eraser pierced through by a pin, the kind with a tiny ball for a head like those found in brand-new shirts.
With Pierog-Sudol explaining how to decorate an egg, European-style, and providing commentary on Easter in Poland, everyone soon got the hang of it. Some of the finished eggs, produced by people of all ages, were really quite lovely.

The ball of the pin head applied the melted wax to the shell, the wax blocking out areas not to be dyed. Pierog-Sudol said this was called pisanki. The method lends itself to floral designs much like a pussy willow, an image identified with springtime and Easter, she said.

Once applied, the wax is not to be removed. It gave the egg an attractive, relief surface. Pierog-Sudol said she once attempted to remove the wax by placing the eggs into a heated oven and ruined everything.

Commercially available egg dyes were used on Sunday. Pierog-Sudol said she likes to double-up on the amount of dye and vinegar given by instructions.

Once the egg was dyed, Pierog-Sudol displayed another technique. She took a sharp knife and scratched away some of the coloring. She called his technique drapanki. By ringing the egg in this manner, an image that looked like a crown of thorns was made. Finished eggs, she said, are given a rubbing with a little olive oil.

A number of the decorators agreed that Easter eggs could last several weeks and still be eaten. But in Poland, Pierog-Sudol said the eggs go sooner.

“They are eaten on Easter, after Resurrection Mass, during Easter breakfast,” she said. “They are blessed in church, in a pussywillow basket, on Holy Saturday, with other foods.”

In the basket, she said, a family places napkins, bread, salt and pepper, butter, eggs, horseradish, kielbasa, ham, bacon, everything to be eaten at Easter breakfast. Appetisers are made from the eggs.

“You don’t eat anything from the basket on Saturday,” she said. “You eat it on Sunday after Resurrection Mass. My family still fasts from Holy Thursday until Easter breakfast.”

Resurrection Mass, she said, is at 6 a.m., and she and her family will be there.