While spring and summer are my favorite seasons, by now I have realized that I have to stop wearing flip flops and embrace the season of sweaters (occasionally at least!) and holiday traditions. Actually, as a nationalized American citizen I have grown to love Thanksgiving. I treasure the opportunity it gives for everyone to take a breath, spend time with loved ones, cook delicious food and not have the pressure, busy schedules and commercialization that comes around with the Christmas season.
It never fails to surprise me when I get asked if we celebrate Thanksgiving back in the UK. I am always tempted to say, “Amazingly we don’t celebrate the survival of puritans who left England in 1620 and shared an autumn harvest feast with Native American people in 1621.” However, I always remember my manners and just smile and say that we don’t but I love this American tradition.
Did you know that for more than two centuries, days of thanksgiving were celebrated on different days by individual colonies and states? It wasn’t until 1863, in the midst of the Civil War, that President Abraham Lincoln proclaimed a national day of Thanksgiving to be held each November. In 1941, the date was set so we count four Thursdays from the start of November to decide the date for Thanksgiving each year.
This means Thanksgiving falls between November 22 and November 28, and of course this year it is very late and takes place next week.
I love preparing for Thanksgiving and enjoy cooking and eating turkey which, back in Great Britain, is almost always part of Christmas dinner. I discovered during my research into the history of Thanksgiving that lobster, seal and swans were on the Pilgrims’ menu back in 1621 so am grateful that tastes and menus have evolved since then. I must admit that I struggle to really enjoy pumpkin pie but I do get very excited when, about this time, eggnog starts appearing in grocery stores.
Eggnog has a surprisingly interesting history.
This creamy, spiced beverage is believed to have originated in the land of my birth. In medieval Britain it was known as “posset,” a comforting mixture of hot milk or cream, wine or ale, and spices. In the 13th century, some monks began adding whipped eggs and figs to their posset—but the scarcity of the more expensive ingredients, including eggs and alcohol, made this early style eggnog a luxury for wealthy people. When the beloved drink crossed continents to North America in the mid-1700s, it became known as “egg-n-grog,” a term loosely derived from the Scottish and Gaelic word noggin, which means small wooden cup, and grog, an English term for hard liquor, often rum. The American colonists soon shortened that to “eggnog,” a term that first appeared in a poem by Maryland minister Jonathan Boucher around 1774.
Records show that in 1775 George Washington served this drink during the Christmas holidays to family and guests at his home in Virginia, with his recipe calling for a staggering one tablespoon of sugar for every egg used.
As milk, eggs, sugar and rum became more affordable and abundant after the Revolutionary War, eggnog became accessible to everyday Americans.
Eggnog had become widespread by the nineteenth century and now is much more popular in the USA than in Britain. While eggnog isn’t universally loved in the U.S.—some Americans loathe it—we nonetheless consume more than 15 million gallons annually, almost all of it between Thanksgiving and Christmas. That works out to around 240 million cups of eggnog each year—just about an average of one for every adult American.
Back in the UK, the most similar festive drink to eggnog is Advocaat. This is often referred to as ‘Dutch eggnog’ but it is different because only egg yolks, sugar and brandy are used so its texture is more like a pudding and it is always very alcoholic.
Since relocating to beautiful Coastal Georgia, I have become a convert to American eggnog. The version I like is made with eggs, milk, cream, spiced cinnamon, nutmeg, and vanilla. The adults in our family usually add a little spiced rum. I also embrace it as an ingredient, making eggnog pie, bread, cookies and more. No wonder I need to go on a diet in January! We still have a few weeks until National Eggnog day on December 24th so there is plenty of time to perfect your recipes.
There is a lot more information at, www.britannica.com, www.smithsonianmag. com and www.history.com I say goodbye this week with a short quote about the coming eggnog season from 20th century Chicago-based columnist and talk show host Irv “Kup” Kupcinet: “An optimist is a person who starts a new diet on Thanksgiving Day.”
God bless America, enjoy your Thanksgiving, and then break out the egg nog!
Lesley grew up in London, England and made Georgia her home in 2009.
She can be contacted at lesley@francis. com or via her full-service marketing agency at www.lesleyfrancispr.com