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Pickle egg salad with mustard and chives

Hard-cooked eggs chopped generously with dill pickles and a modest mustard mayonnaise dressing for sandwiches or a lunch plate.

By PickleRadio editorialUpdated
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Chopped hard-cooked eggs with pickles and chives in a creamy dressing.
In this guide5 sections

Keep some pieces of egg

Egg salad becomes pasty if every part of the egg is mashed. We mash only a little yolk into the dressing, then fold in the rest of the chopped eggs. The result is easier to pile on bread and gives you soft egg pieces alongside the sharper pickle.

Yield: 4 sandwich-filling servings. Prep time: 20 minutes. Cook time: 20 minutes. Allow at least 10 minutes for the eggs to cool. Use large eggs and check that the whites and yolks are firm after cooking. A jammy yolk is enjoyable elsewhere but makes this particular filling less predictable.

Ingredients

  • 6 large eggs
  • 80 g (3 oz) drained dill pickles
  • 60 g (2 oz) shop-bought mayonnaise
  • 10 g (2 teaspoons) Dijon mustard
  • 10 ml (2 teaspoons) pickle brine
  • 5 g fresh chives, finely sliced
  • ¼ teaspoon ground black pepper

Method

  1. Place the eggs in a saucepan and cover with cold water by about 2 cm. Bring to the boil, reduce to a gentle simmer and cook for about 12 minutes. The yolk and white should be firm. Transfer carefully to cold water and cool completely before peeling.
  2. Peel the eggs and rinse away any shell fragments, then pat dry. Cut one egg in half and mash its yolk in a mixing bowl; chop the rest of that egg and the other five into roughly 1 cm pieces.
    Pale oak board with peeled firm-boiled eggs being chopped into roughly 1 cm pieces, fully set yellow yolks and opaque whites, safe knife resting beside chopped pieces.
    Leave small egg pieces and mash one yolk separately for the dressing.
  3. Dice the drained pickles finely and blot on a clean towel. Slice the chives with a sharp knife so they remain small rings rather than being crushed into a wet paste.
  4. Mix the mayonnaise, mustard, brine and black pepper with the mashed yolk. Work out any large dry yolk lumps before adding the chopped egg, when vigorous stirring would break everything down.
    Small cream ceramic mixing bowl with one mashed firm egg yolk, mayonnaise, Dijon mustard, measured pickle brine and pepper being worked smooth with a fork.
    Work the mashed yolk smooth before adding the chopped eggs.
  5. Fold the chopped eggs, pickles and chives into the dressing. Taste a small portion, then cover and refrigerate until serving. Use a spoon to lift the mixture into a sandwich rather than spreading it hard against the bread.
    Cream ceramic mixing bowl of roughly chopped firm eggs, small dill-pickle cubes and chive rings being folded into pale creamy dressing with a spoon.
    Fold gently so the white and yolk pieces remain distinct.

A filling, not a wet dressing

Pickle brine is measured in teaspoons here because the eggs do not need much liquid. If your pickles are especially wet, blot them twice rather than reducing the egg pieces to compensate. You should be able to lift a rounded spoonful without a stream running off its underside.

For a neatly cut sandwich, fill close to serving time. If you are taking lunch to work, carry the egg salad in a small chilled container and assemble it there. That also makes it easier to judge how much filling your particular bread can hold.

Use the same egg-and-pickle combination in pickle deviled eggs for sharing, or choose tuna salad with the same sharp crunch for a different sandwich.

Chopped dill pickles draining in a sieve before mixing.
Drain chopped pickles before adding them to a creamy mixture.

Serving and keeping

Use within three refrigerated days of cooking the eggs. Keep cold when travelling.

Keep the jar open

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