We at the Pixeladies Studio want to wish you all happy holidays. We hope you can be with family and friends, are happy and healthy, and looking forward to the possibilities of many tomorrows. We’ve already had our wine-tasting dinner this year with old friends. It was loads of fun, and the wine was delicious. We topped it off with Neil’s famous eggnog. It goes perfectly with Deb’s coffee butter cookies or our friend Mary’s the homemade Lebkuchen. Kris tried to cajole her husband into divulging his secret recipe for this blog post. That didn’t happen, but we can let you in on some good eggnog ideas and anecdotes that will hopefully enhance your eggnog-drinking reverie:
Eggs
Even though we buy organic eggs, Neil still pasteurizes them. Tests have indicated that storing eggnog made with alcohol contains almost no bacteria after a few weeks, but who can wait that long? (By the way, we have been known to sip that last cup during a Super Bowl game). To pasteurize your eggs, Neil says:
After you mix, fluff, and fold in all the non-alcoholic ingredients into a big pot, bring the mixture to 160° F (use a candy thermometer) and quickly remove from heat.
Neil does strain his eggnog when all is finished. Store your eggnog in the refrigerator.
Alcohol
If you don’t drink alcohol, there’s no reason to start, but for those who do, Neil swears by Meyer’s Original Dark Rum. He’s less picky about the brandy, because he doesn’t like to spend much, if it’s going into an eggnog.
Recipes
While Neil won’t give up his recipe, our local paper comes out with some almost every year. Click here for some interesting ones, but you’ll probably see some in your own local paper. And check your old cookbooks. They’re loaded with great recipes you can’t find anymore. Looking at the recipes made me (Kris, that is) think about how to spell eggnog (egg nog? egg-nog?) and then to ask what the heck does nog mean anyway? Thanks to good ol’ Wikipedia, I learned that noggins were the wooden cups alcohol was served in. Click here to read more about the etymology of the word eggnog.
Nutmeg
Since we were going to serve the eggnog this year at a party, I looked for whole nutmeg to grate. I found some in the bulk organic spice section of our local grocery store, so it’s probably available at most places. Don’t let the high price fool you; each nutmeg costs about $1.25, and one nut goes a loooong way!
You can see in the photo at the top of this post that we used a ginger grater this year, but I did wonder about getting a real nutmeg grinder. My mind wanders, so this all led me to thinking about the first time I encountered the word “Muskat” (“nutmeg” in German). Forty years ago I was looking for a pepper grinder while living in Germany and came across all sorts of cool “Muskat” grinders. It’s funny how you can actually remember how you learned one specific word in another language! Now I’m thinking it’s time to finally buy that nutmeg grinder. I googled nutmeg grinder and came up with my four favorite ones. What do you think? My thoughts are below:
- traditional, it has the word “Muskat” on it! I’ll never forget how to say nutmeg in German!
- love the way the nutmeg is displayed, but will every size nutmeg fit into the cylinder?
- seriously cool, made by Peugeot (I can only assume the car people) which means this has the Peugeot price tag to go along with it!
- old school grater, but this grater has a place to store the nutmegs. It’s also small enough to fit into the spice drawer and was the cheapest of the group. I think I now know what Santa is getting Neil this year. (Yes, gifts the spouse will like but I have always wanted are win-win!)
Cheers!
So here’s a toast to all our friends, family, students, and fellow artists. Thank you for coming along with us on our Pixeladies journey. May our paths cross often. See you in 2020! (Maybe Neil will give up his recipe then!)
