Christmas means many things to many people, but for me Christmas means eggnog.
Two of my happiest childhood memories are of drinking homemade eggnog while watching Freaky Friday (isn't that everyone's holiday classic?) and of placing a fresh glass next to my bed on Christmas Eve to satisfy the inevitable middle-of-the-night, holiday-specific eggnog craving. Every time I see eggnog I'm immediately transported, a la Proustian Madeline, to that happy moment where my lips first met the tantalizing foamy mixture of raw egg, sugar, cream, milk and nutmeg.
It should come as no surprise, then, that when my husband suggested a Christmas weekend, I immediately thought "EGGNOG"! We listened to Fred and Bing croon essential holiday tunes, decorated our mini-table-tree, watched National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation and, of course, made and drank some eggnog.
I followed a Gourmet Today recipe for cooked eggnog, ready to be drawn back to childhood with each sip of homemade custardy goodness. Instead I ended up with a bellyache from too much sugar and the realization that my eggnog impressions were created when I loved white chocolate, had Rainbow Brite sheets and wore my hair in a side ponytail.
Maybe some recollections are meant to be cherished and not relived, but for some reason I just can't give up the hope of discovering an eggnog that can resurrect the belle epoque of childhood at Christmas.
This reminds me of how you they kept trying to give us pisco sours with raw egg in them all over S. America and you always refused! Maybe it was the raw egg and not the sugar that caused your bellyache;-)
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