The Nog of Our Fathers

Last night, I made Batch Four.

Batch Three lasted almost a full day, but was undeniably describable as "milk with nutmeg in it". To compensate and create balance within the cosmos, I reached back into the furthest annals of time and made a batch of egg nog whose recipe is from 1958.

It's surprisingly close to the canonical Alton Brown recipe, but with a few significant differences. I reproduce it here for posterity, noting that it originally appeared in The New York Times in 1958 in an article by Craig Claiborne.

12 eggs, separated

1 cup granulated sugar

1 cup bourbon

1 cup Cognac

0.5 teaspoon salt

3 pints heavy cream

Grated nutmeg

1 to 2 cups milk (optional)

1. In an electric mixer, beat the egg yolks with the sugar until thick.

2. Slowly add the bourbon and Cognac while beating at slow speed. Chill for several hours.

3. Add the salt to the egg whites. Beat until almost stiff.

4. Whip the cream until stiff.

5. Fold the whipped cream into the yolk mixture, then fold in the beaten egg whites. Chill 1 hour.

6. When ready to serve, sprinkle the top with freshly grated nutmeg. Serve in punch cups with a spoon.

7. If desired, add 1 to 2 cups of milk to the yolk mixture for a thinner eggnog. Makes about 40 punch-cup servings.

This makes a crazy-thick nog (3 pints of cream?!), so to make something that might be remotely drinkable, I went with 1 cup cream and 2 cups reduced-fat milk.

Yeah, I'm a pussy like that.

The interesting differences in this recipe are the adding of the booze to the yolks, followed by a long marinate. Hopefully, this will give a richer flavor, and not a sophomoric one of "Hey, this is egg nog that you poured bourbon into, isn't it?"

Also, whipping the cream adds a ton of volume. Using AB's recipe, I was lucky to fill my designated nog pitcher halfway, and that includes the foam. As this recipe turned out, even when dividing all quantities by three I had a full pitcher of something creamy yellowish and, hopefully, tasty.

Whip your cream, folks. It's just as easy as that. Monk will hate this batch. I guarantee it.