Front Burner: A nod to ‘nog
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The most commonly despised foods and drinks tend to share one characteristic: they are in some way overpowering to the senses.
Cilantro and liver, for example, are strongly flavored. Limburger cheese and durian fruit are an assault to the nasal passages. Oysters and okra? Well, they’re a textural turn-off for many people.
The holiday season most assuredly has its share of foods that are disliked, if not despised. Chief among them, sitting right on the throne next to the fruitcake, is eggnog — that sweet, thick, creamy bastion of holiday happiness.
Or horror, if it’s not your thing.
While I adore eggnog, I know it has its haters. I happen to live with one who declares the beverage too viscous, too sweet, and just plain “gross.”
When I introduced this polarizing topic on my Fridge Magnet blog recently, I fully expected the ratio of haters to lovers to be 50-50. However, while I found that those who don’t like it are pretty adamant, most readers who responded said they enjoy eggnog, and some even wish it were available all year long.
A recurring theme in our conversation was that quality counts when it comes to this particular beverage, and those who are familiar with homemade eggnog said no store-bought version can ever compare.
To continue reading this column, click here.
Click these links to see recipes for:
Cooked Eggnog*
Spiced Chocolate Eggnog
Eggnog French Toast
Eggnog Bread or Muffins (a recipe submitted by Wendy Blair, owner of Rose Hill Bed and Breakfast in Old Southwest Roanoke).
* A note about this recipe. I made it twice – once with my KitchenAid stand mixer fitted with the whisk attachment and once with a handheld electric mixer fitted with standard beaters. I found that the handheld mixer worked better. Four egg yolks is not really enough to use the stand mixer. If you doubled the recipe, however, it might work better. When I used the hand mixer, the egg yolks were a butter color by the time I finished adding the sugar.
December 19, 2012 - 5:55 AM
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For all you eggnog lovers out there do a Google search for eggnog cheesecake or eggnog cake. I made the eggnog cake one year and the flavor wasn’t very distinctive, maybe this year I will try the eggnog cheesecake…
I am an egg nog lover around the holiday season. If you like egg nog as well as pumpkin, i suggest you try the pumpkin eggnog i stumbled across recently at food lion. Great stuff!!
Several of the frozen yogurt places (Sweet Frog, for example) offer egg nog yogurt at various times during the non-holiday seasons.
Would that be, “egg nogurt”?
Unrelated, but a holiday dilemma nonetheless, does anyone know where to find Amarino cherries in Roanoke?
Jason, if you are asking on the blog I’m guessing you already tried Fresh Market. But something gourmet and fairly unusual like that is probably only going to be at Fresh Market or another store that sells a lot of gourmet food products, like maybe Provisions in Roanoke or Gourmet Pantry in Blacksburg.
It looks like you can order them online, but you probably want them for a holiday recipe. Sometimes the high-end Kroger stores like at Bonsack or Brambleton have an amazing selection of unusual products. If you find them I’d be interested to know where! Good luck!
I’m not a big fan of eggnog, but my husband adores it! I never thought about trying to make it at home, but have discovered that Homestead Creamery makes a killer eggnog. PLUS, I discovered their eggnog ice cream. Yummy!
They DO have yummy eggnog, Pam.