Eggnog
Eggnog, historically also known as a milk punch or an egg milk punch when alcoholic beverages are added, is a rich, chilled, sweetened, dairy-based beverage traditionally made with milk, cream, sugar, egg yolk and whipped egg white. A distilled spirit such as brandy, rum, whiskey or bourbon is often a key ingredient.
Throughout North America and some European countries, eggnog is traditionally consumed over the Christmas season, from early November to late December. A variety called ponche crema has been made and consumed in the Dominican Republic, Venezuela, and Trinidad since the 1900s, also as part of the Christmas season. During that time, commercially prepared eggnog is sold in grocery stores in these countries.
Eggnog is also homemade using milk, eggs, sugar, and flavourings, and served with cinnamon or nutmeg. While eggnog is often served chilled, in some cases it is warmed, particularly on cold days. Eggnog or eggnog flavouring may also be added to other drinks, such as coffee and tea, or to dessert foods such as egg-custard puddings.
Terminology
The Modern Bartender's Guide from 1878 lists many variant names for the drink. It distinguishes "plain eggnog," "egg milk punch," and "milk punch" from one another. It also includes variants such as "Baltimore eggnog," "General Jackson eggnog," "Imperial eggnog," two types of "sherry cobbler eggnog," as well as "sherry cobbler with egg," "mulled claret with egg," "egg sour," and "Saratoga egg lemonade".History
Etymology and origins
The origins, etymology, and the ingredients used to make original eggnog drinks are debated.According to the Oxford English Dictionary, nog was "a kind of strong beer brewed in East Anglia". The first known use of the word nog was in 1693. Alternatively, nog may stem from the word noggin, a Middle English term for a small, carved wooden mug used to serve alcohol.
Posset, a curdled beverage of milk and either wine or ale, was a popular beverage in Britain that may have been a precursor to eggnog. Some monks would add eggs and figs to posset. However, the British drink was also called an egg flip, from the practice of "flipping" the mixture between two pitchers to mix it. One dictionary lists the word eggnog as being an Americanism invented in 1765–75.
Babson College professor Frederick Douglass Opie contends that the term derives from two colonial slang words: grog that bartenders served in noggins. From here came egg and grog, then egg-n-grog, and finally the portmanteau eggnog. Barry Popik disputes the "egg and grog" theory on the basis that there is absolutely no evidence to support it.
Another suggestion is that nog is related to the Scottish term nugg or nugged ale, meaning "ale warmed with a hot poker".
The Online Etymology Dictionary states that eggnog was an American neologism of 1775, a compound of egg and nog, the latter term meaning "strong ale".
The earliest documented example of eggnog dates to 1775, when Maryland clergyman and philologist Jonathan Boucher wrote a poem about the drink: "Fog-drams i' th' morn, or egg-nogg, / At night hot-suppings, and at mid-day, grogg, / My palate can regale". Boucher's verse was not, however, published until 30 years after his death, thus the word first appeared in print only in 1788, in the March 26 edition of the New-Jersey Journal in an article referring to a young man drinking a glass of eggnog. An 1869 dictionary entry for eggnog defines it as a mixture of wine, spirits, eggs and sugar; there is no mention of dairy products.
"While culinary historians debate its exact lineage, most agree eggnog originated from the early medieval" British drink called posset, which was made with hot milk that was curdled with wine or ale and flavored with spices. In the Middle Ages, posset was used as a cold and flu remedy. Posset was popular from medieval times to the 19th century. Eggs were added to some posset recipes; according to Time magazine, by the "13th century, monks were known to drink a posset with eggs and figs." A 17th century recipe for "My Lord of Carlisle's Sack-Posset" uses a heated mixture of cream, whole cinnamon, mace, nutmeg, eighteen egg yolks, eight egg whites, and one pint of Sack wine. At the end, sugar, ambergris and animal musk are stirred in. Posset was traditionally served in two-handled pots. The aristocracy had costly posset pots made from silver.
Eggnog is not the only mixed, sweetened alcohol drink associated with winter. Mulled wine or wassail is a drink made by Ancient Greeks and Romans with sweetened, spiced wine. When the drink spread to Britain, the locals switched to the more widely available alcohol, hard cider, to make their mulled beverages. During the Victorian era, Britons drank purl, "a heady mixture of gin, warm beer, sugar, bitter herbs, and spices". In the Colonial era in America, the drink was transformed into an "ale-and-rum-based flip" warmed with a hot poker.
Development
In Britain, the drink was originally popular among the aristocracy. "Milk, eggs, and sherry were foods of the wealthy, so eggnog was often used in toasts to prosperity and good health." Those who could afford milk and eggs and costly spirits mixed the eggnog with brandy, Madeira wine or sherry to make a drink similar to modern alcoholic eggnog.The drink crossed the Atlantic to the British colonies during the 18th century. Since brandy and wine were heavily taxed, rum from the Atlantic slave trade with the Caribbean was a cost-effective substitute. The inexpensive liquor, coupled with plentiful farm and dairy products available to colonists, helped the drink become very popular in America. When the supply of rum to the newly founded United States was reduced as a consequence of the American Revolutionary War, Americans turned to domestic whiskey, and eventually bourbon in particular, as a substitute. In places in the American colonies where even bourbon was too expensive, homemade moonshine spirits were added to eggnog. Eggnog "became tied to the holidays" when it was adopted in the United States in the 1700s. Eggnog "seems to have been popular on both sides of the Atlantic" in the 18th century.
Records show that the first US president, George Washington, "served an eggnog-like drink to visitors" which included "rye whiskey, rum, and sherry." The President's recipe called for a variety of alcoholic beverages along with the dairy and egg ingredients: "One quart cream, one quart milk, one dozen tablespoons sugar, one pint brandy, 1/2 pint rye whiskey, 1/2 pint Jamaica rum, 1/4 pint sherry." The recipe instructs cooks to "mix liquor first, then separate yolks and whites of eggs, add sugar to beaten yolks, mix well. Add milk and cream, slowly beating. Beat whites of eggs until stiff and fold slowly into mixture. Let set in cool place for several days. Taste frequently." The recipe did not specify the number of eggs to use, however modern chefs estimate approximately one dozen.
"Tom and Jerry is a form of hot eggnog that was once popular." The Tom and Jerry was invented by British journalist Pierce Egan in the 1820s, using brandy and rum added to eggnog and served hot, usually in a mug or a bowl. It is a traditional Christmastime cocktail in the United States.
Isaac Weld, Junior, in his book Travels Through the States of North America and the Provinces of Upper and Lower Canada, during the years 1795, 1796, and 1797 wrote: "The American travelers, before they pursued their journey, took a hearty draught each, according to custom, of egg-nog, a mixture composed of new milk, eggs, rum, and sugar, beat up together". In a similar way to how posset was drunk as a cold remedy in the Medieval era, there is evidence that eggnog was also used as a medical treatment. An 1892 scientific journal article proposes the use of eggnog to treat "grippe", commonly known as the "flu", along with ammonium chloride to treat the cough and quinine to cure the illness.
In the American South, eggnog is made with bourbon. Eggnog is called "coquito" in Puerto Rico, where rum and fresh coconut juice or coconut milk are used in its preparation. Mexican eggnog, also known as "rompope", was developed in Santa Clara. It differs from regular eggnog in its use of Mexican cinnamon and rum or grain alcohol. In Peru, eggnog is called "biblia con pisco", and it is made with a Peruvian spirit called pisco. German eggnog, called "biersuppe", is made with beer. "Eierpunsch" is a German version of eggnog made with white wine, eggs, sugar, cloves, tea, lemon or lime juice and cinnamon. Another recipe dating from 1904 calls for eggs, lemon juice, sugar, white wine, water and rum. In Iceland, eggnog "is served hot as a dessert."
Ingredients and serving style
Homemade
Traditional homemade eggnog is made of milk or cream, sugar, raw eggs, one or more alcoholic spirits, and spices, often vanilla or nutmeg and in some recipes, cloves. Some recipes call for the eggs to be separated so that the egg whites can be whipped until they are thick; this gives the drink a frothy texture. American food show presenter Alton Brown points out that based on its ingredients, eggnog is "almost identical to ice cream. It is technically just a stirred custard made of milk and egg".Homemade recipes may use vanilla ice cream blended into the beverage, particularly when the goal is to create a chilled drink. Some recipes call for condensed milk or evaporated milk in addition to milk and cream. Acidophilus milk, a fermented milk product, has been used to make eggnog. While some recipes call for unwhipped heavy cream, in some recipes, whipped cream is added to the mixture, which gives it a frothier texture. Various sweeteners are used, such as white sugar, brown sugar and maple syrup.
There are variations in ingredients in different recipes. Traditional eggnog has a significant fat content, due to the use of cream, and a high sugar content. Ingredients vary significantly between different recipes. Alcohol used in different national and regional versions of eggnog include brandy, cognac, bourbon, whiskey, sherry, rum and grain alcohol. Canadian chef Heidi Fink states that one of the reasons people are making less homemade eggnog is that the beverage is expensive to make, due to its use of substantial quantities of cream, eggs, and spirits. Concerns about the safety of raw eggs may be another reason for the decline in homemade eggnog making.