Wednesday, November 26, 2008

It's Time!



There are two kinds of people in the world:  1) Those who hear a drink is made from heavy cream, raw eggs, sugar, and spices and want to puke and 2) Those who hear a drink is made from heavy cream, raw eggs, sugar, and spices and can't wait for every December to drink it! I've observed the latter usually love Christmas Musicals as well. I bet you can guess which one I am...

Even the most avid eggnog lover knows that it can become too much extremely fast, so it took me nearly 3 years to try enough eggnogs to have a confident favorite.  I'm going to save you that trouble, and tell you the best 'nogs money can buy!

I need to say first that I had my opinions, but I also looked up a couple of articles online to see what other people had thought. To my surprise, the reviews I read were very similar to mine.

Here are the ones I've tried in order from worst to best:

5. The Singularly Hideous: Silk Soy "Nog" $2.99 a quart.  Ok, really, if you're someone who doesn't eat animal products why in the world would you even have a hankering for eggnog? I suppose that question is irrelevant, because this stuff tastes nothing like it.

4. The Terribly Disappointing: Strauss Family Creamery. $5.25 a quart.  The facts that this egg nog came in an old-timey glass bottle, is from a family business, is raw eggnog, and is pretty darn expensive made me so want this to be delicious.  The honest truth is that it's not plain awful, it's just plain.

3. The "what the heck?": Horizon Organic $3.69 a quart.  I thought this was waaaay too sweet, and coming from a baker, that's really sweet. I was not surprised to find other articles that agreed.  One called it "throat-scorching."

2. The Most Reliable: Alta Dena. Can't remember how much. Luckily, one of the best ones is the cheapest and readily available at most grocery stores.

1. The Favorite: Organic Valley $3.69 a quart.  Ok, the reason I checked other eggnog taste tests is because I was wondering if the organic name was swaying my opinion.  But I now see that I am right.  This is agreed to be the best eggnog you can buy at a store.  They sell it at Whole Foods.

Two other things about eggnog I learned while reading other articles:
- Store bought eggnogs do not mix well with alchohol...
-But they taste great as a replacement for cream in your coffee or tea!



3 comments:

The Saunders said...

One of the easiest ways to show Joe I love him is by buying him some good quality eggnog :) (well, I care about the "good quality" part more than he does I am sure) Have you ever tried to do the "homemade" thing before.....just curious how it turned out.

Anonymous said...

Just an FYI - The Straus Egg Nog is NOT RAW. Another thing to point out is that it is the only Nog that doesn't have fillers, gums and high fructose corn syrup.

Naka and Raj said...

Wow, thanks for that shout out to Straus. I'm so glad you enjoy it! I do apologize for my loose use of the word "raw." What I meant was that it is not "ultra-pasteurized."

Also, just so everyone is informed correctly- Organic Valley Egg Nog also does not have fillers, gums, and high fructose corn syrup. Straus is definitely not the only one, but it is certainly one of them!