Independence Nog

Picture this: you return home from a long summer road trip, the weather outside is so hot that your shoes are sticking to the pavement (but at least the dew point is only 82 °F!), and your car's air conditioner puttered out 50 miles from home.  You're now sweating buckets, and you can't wait to get into your humble but cool abode, which you left at a comfortable yet energy-conscious 75 °F.  Now imagine that you swing open your front door only to be greeted by a blast of warm, steamy air even hotter than the outside...your house's air conditioner also puttered out, and your roof has been acting like a solar collector oven since early this morning.  You flop down into your thankfully-not-leather couch and wonder, "how can I possibly find some relief from this heat?" 

Obviously, your next move should be to fire up your computer and log on to The Homestead Laboratory to see if those guys have any ideas.  Imagine your delight when you find out that they have the perfect concoction to liberate you from your heat-induced misery while simultaneously celebrating the liberation of the good ol' USA from those silly-hat-wearing redcoats!  (...and also freedom from only being allowed to drink eggnog on Christmas and Easter.)  That's right!  We like to celebrate independence of all kinds with a tall (chilled) glass of eggnog, or in this case, independence nog.

The recipe starts out just like before--separate out six egg yolks and beat them until they're thick and light yellow.  Add 1.5 c milk and heat them up to 160 °F to kill any salmonella that might be lurking, then add 0.25-0.5 c sugar depending on your inclinations, and another 1.5 c milk.  This is where it gets interesting:

Where we're from, independence is celebrated with red, white, and blue.  We've got some red and blue berries, so we'll add those.  Also, you can see that we went a little overboard with our pasteurization again and a few pieces of the egg set up like a firm  custard.  Don't worry--the stick blender will take care of that!

After blenderizing everything with the stick blender, the red, blue, and yellow became this lovely purple color.  That's ok.  We'll add more red and blue later.

But first let's add some white!  Vanilla ice cream!  Yeah!  (It floats, therefore we conclude that ice cream is less dense than eggnog bubbles.)

There we go...red, white, and blue.  With a purple background. We, um...needed the purple to make the white stand out.  (Right?)  The nice thing is, if the berries are cold, they help cool down the eggnog so it's drinkable right away.  Good stuff, Maynard!

The recipe:
6 egg yolks
1.5 cups milk
another 1.5 cups milk
1/3 cup sugar
1/2 cup each red and blue berries (e.g., strawberries and blueberries)
another few berries for garnish
1 scoop per cup vanilla ice cream

Beat egg yolks and 1.5 cups milk until uniform.  Heat mixture to 160 °F, stirring often.  Add sugar and stir until dissolved, then add rest of milk and 1/2 cup each fruit.  Homogenize with stick blender.  Chill, garnish with vanilla ice cream and more berries, and drink.  Appreciate sovereignity.

What do you drink on the 4th of July?  What kinds of red and blue things would you add to your independence nog?  Tell us in the comments section below!