Nothing but nog
It's got a mysterious history and a texture that's more lubricant than libation. But old-fashioned eggnog is still America's holiday cocktail of choice.
By Robert Sietsema
Read more: Christmas, Drinking, Eating, Holidays, Recipes, Life, Eat and Drink, Food and Travel
Dec. 19, 2006 | What the hell is a nog anyway? Among the festive beverages of Christmas -- including the wassail bowl of warm ale bobbing with apples; the mixture of Scotch and ginger wine known as whisky mac; and the traditional Yuletide punch of rum, brandy, lemons and oranges -- eggnog reigns supreme. So far-reaching is its popularity that, come Thanksgiving, red-and-green cartons of it line the dairy cases of nearly every supermarket across the U.S.
The origins of the word "nog" are shrouded in mystery. It might be a wooden block embedded in a brick wall, into which nails are driven for mounting things. Or it could be a dark foamy ale that's been brewed in Norfolk, England, since the 1600s. But nowadays a nog rarely stands on its own, occurring mainly in compound form as eggnog. Even Webster's definition, with its elastic recipe -- "An often alcoholic drink containing beaten egg, milk, or both" -- asks more questions than it answers. And what about "noggin"? It's a waggish term for one's cranium, of course, but the dictionary lists two further meanings: 1) a small quantity of drink, or 2) a small carved mug -- which led one commentator to suggest with apparent seriousness that eggnog actually represents a shortening of the bar-side request, "Egg and grog in a noggin, please." Say it real fast when tipsy, and it turns into "eggnog," I guess.
Some accounts claim that Capt. John Smith knocked back bumpers of eggnog in Jamestown, Va., as early as 1607, and that this "nog" is really just a corruption of the word "grog." In line with 17th century English recipes, Smith's eggnog would have been a simple concoction of ale mixed with eggs, which sounds vile. But, hey, isn't that just like having a hangover remedy mixed in with the substance that produced the hangover in the first place? What is certain as far as eggnog and Virginia are concerned is that George and Martha Washington indulged in it during their 1769 Christmas festivities at Millbank -- his sister Betty Lewis' stately home near Williamsburg -- as part of an oddly modern-sounding dinner featuring ham made from hogs fed on mash from George's Mount Vernon distillery, oysters from the nearby Rappahannock River, fresh corn from the surrounding fields baked into a souffli, cucumber pickles and pumpkin chips -- whatever those were. Washington must have been a big fan of eggnog, because he had his own special recipe that, in addition to eggs, milk and cream, was spiked with brandy, whisky, rum and sherry. Clean out the liquor cabinet, why don't you, George?
It's tempting to assume eggnog is British, partly on the basis of the Anglo-Saxon derivation of the name, and partly because of English punches it resembles. But what if eggnog is really an American invention? That would explain why, unlike the English prototypes, no modern American version features ale or beer. Also, the presence of rum in our most common recipes is a reminder that rum -- a byproduct of the trade in sugar cane and slaves in the New World -- was the most abundant alcohol in the Colonies. Finally, an additional piece of evidence for an American origin involves Alexis Soyer, the French expatriate chef and enterprising humanitarian who invented the soup kitchen to address the Irish famine and the camp stove to cook for wounded Crimean War soldiers. It seems one of Soyer's more harebrained schemes, described by Sarah Freeman in her book "Mutton & Oysters," was to open an American-style bar in London serving American cocktails. One of the cocktails prominently mentioned? Eggnog, of course.
Still other theorists opine that eggnog didn't originate with the Brits, but was an American adaptation of a French recipe dating from a time in the 18th century when American colonists were tight with the French (and I mean that in more ways than one). The French recipe is known as "lait de poule," which translates, repulsively, as "chicken milk." In modern Quebec, the drink goes by the name lait de poule to this day, though the rest of Anglophone Canada calls it an "eggflip," which suggests to me not an Xmas beverage laced with rum, but one dosed with LSD. While modern Québécois quaffers associate lait de poule with an American-style Christmas, the drink got a nod 150 years ago in Gustave Flaubert's "Madame Bovary," in which the character Justin asks for one to fortify himself, presumably for sexual purposes. (Oh yeah, Emma was hot!) The aggressively luxurious egg, cream and milk composition of eggnog also suggests a French origin. In Normandy and Brittany -- provinces that produced the greatest migration to Maritime Canada -- such a relentless use of rich dairy products is the epitome of good cooking.
Of course, one more permutation of eggnog needs to be addressed. How did the hot version come to be called a "Tom and Jerry"? When I was a kid in Minnesota, the eggnog my brothers and I furtively gulped right from the carton contained plenty of rum flavoring, but no actual alcohol. We couldn't help noticing our parents sipped a warmed and considerably more alcoholic version, called Tom and Jerry, out of pressed-glass punch bowls at their Christmas parties. Naturally, we thought the name was a tribute to the animated cat and mouse who chased each other across our black-and-white TV -- and it seemed a fitting one for a drink that made adults act as silly as cartoon characters.
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