Eggnog is a favourite of mine!
It is traditional in some countries to have it during the festive season of Christmas. In our family, it was not a tradition and I think I have figured out why. I grew up in the tropical paradise of Jamaica. The biggest food/drink tradition is the well-known Jamaican fruit cake. It does require a lot of eggs and so eggs are usually scarce around this time, especially for poor families who would prefer to save their eggs for the Christmas cake rather than for use in eggnog. So, in our family, we would have eggnog at other times of the year and never ever homemade.
I have discovered that eggnog is really simple and easy to make and if you have the time, you can do it yourself. I did it recently and I will share the recipe here with you now. By the way, this is alcohol-free eggnog. I don’t personally like the smell or taste of alcohol and I can’t see that it would enhance the flavour. I do get that some people prefer the alcoholic version but hey ho! Their liver! Here’s the recipe:
Non-Alcoholic Eggnog Recipe
Ingredients
1 pint milk
1/2 cup sugar
1 tsp nutmeg
1 tsp vanilla
2 cinnamon barks or 3 leaves
4 egg yolks
Optional: mace
Method
Infuse flavours into the milk. To do this, pour the milk into a saucepan and add the nutmeg, cinnamon and mace.
Put on cooker, medium heat (do not let it boil)
Whilst the milk is being infused, in a large bowl whisk together the egg yolks and sugar until the mixture is lighter in colour.
Remove the milk from the flame, strain it to leave just the milk.
Whisk in the warmed milk a little at a time to the yolk and sugar mixture. Too much at once will give you scrambled eggs, you do not want this.
After all the milk is added, return this to the saucepan, this time on low heat.
Continue to whisk until you can feel the mixture thickening. This takes about 5 to 7 minutes.
Allow to cool, then pour in your favourite jug and chill.
Serve chilled. I prefer without ice or half-frozen like a slushie.
If you do try this recipe, tell us what you think, and do you prefer the alcoholic or the non-alcoholic version?
Enjoy!
You might also enjoy this pink snow punch which is another festive drink for the season.
Kim Carberry says
Every year I say I am going to make eggnog but never do. This year I will make a point of trying your recipe, it really is simple. I thought there was more to it. Thank you for sharing. x
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