I Hereby Dub Thee Sir Egg of Nog!

Like so many oth­er things, eggnog from scratch is far more deli­cious than eggnog from the store.

  • Ingre­di­ents!
  • 6 large egg yolks
  • 1⁄2 cup gran­u­lat­ed sugar
  • 1 cup heavy whip­ping cream
  • 2 cups whole milk
  • 1⁄2 tea­spoon ground nutmeg
  • A pinch of salt
  • 1⁄4 tea­spoon vanil­la extract 
    • Option­al: ground cin­na­mon (to taste, for top­ping)1
    • Option­al: Alco­hol (tra­di­tion­al­ly bour­bon or rum)
    • Option­al: Pow­dered cinnamon
    • Option­al: Whipped cream
  • Tools!
  • Fine-mesh strain­er

Directions

In a large bowl, whisk togeth­er the egg yolks and sug­ar until creamy. Set aside.

With a saucepan over medi­um heat, com­bine the cream, milk, nut­meg and salt, stir­ring often until the mix­ture just begins to simmer.

Remove from heat; add to the eggs mix­ture about a table­spoon at a time, whisk­ing con­stant­ly to tem­per the eggs. I like to pour a cou­ple of cups at a time to a glass mea­sur­ing cup and pour a lit­tle bit at time. When I do it with an actu­al spoon it gets messy. YMMV.

Once all the hot milk is added to the eggs, pour the mix­ture back into the saucepan on the stove on medi­um heat. This is where your ther­mome­ter comes in: Stir con­stant­ly for a few more min­utes until it hits 160° and starts thickening.

Remove from heat and stir in the vanil­la and alco­hol, if you’re includ­ing it.

Pour the eggnog through a fine mesh strain­er into anoth­er con­tain­er and cov­er with plas­tic wrap. 

Refrig­er­ate until chilled. It will thick­en as it cools; when it’s nice and cold, serve with sprin­kle of cin­na­mon and/or nut­meg on top; top it off with whipped cream if you like. It’ll last about week in the fridge, but if you’re like me long-term stor­age won’t be a problem.

  1. I’ve noticed that recipes for eggnog like to show a rolled cin­na­mon stick in the mug. That’s too expen­sive for me, not to men­tion that it makes the eggnog taste like you added a cou­ple table­spoons of cin­na­mon per up. YMMV.