Salted Eggs (Chinese Preserved Eggs)

Recently, I've been thinking a lot about the stuff my mom used to make when I was a kid. Because of the myriad of foods I was introduced to as a kid, I grew up experiencing flavors and foods that I took for granted as much as American kids take PB&J for granted. One such item is the salted (preserved) egg. The luscious, golden yolk was the coveted prize and can be found within many Asian dishes - Lotus leaf wrapped sticky rice, glutinous rice and chicken, bamboo leaf wrapped sticky rice dumplings, moon cakes, silken (steamed) eggs, clay pot rice - just to name a few.

However, it's been a fairly elusive ingredient to obtain. If you're lucky enough to live close to an asian market, you'll have to shell out about twice as much as a regular egg for the preserved egg. So, I decided to make my own following my mom's instructions. :D

My first attempt came out better than I'd hoped and I'll soon use them to make some of my childhood favorites.

Ingredients: 

2 to 4 oz of strong alcohol (I used whiskey).
1/2 c kosher salt.
6 Large chicken eggs

Directions: 

Rinse and dry the eggs
Dip egg in the alcohol
Coat egg with salt
Wrap egg w/ plastic wrap
Add a few drops of the whiskey and more salt before closing up the plastic wrap
Repeat for all eggs
Place wrapped eggs back into the bottom half of the egg carton
Place carton of eggs in a ziplock baggie big enough to hold the carton
Leave for 20-30 days on the counter.
Remove from wrap and rinse salt off.
You can crack one open at day 20 to check.

They are done when the yolk holds its perfectly spherical shape and is a deep orange color, and the whites would be fairly watery.