Jellied Holiday Nog with Cranberry Orange Sauce, circa 9174

I tend to be a bit of an old-fashioned purist about “the holiday season”. I grew up in a time when Thanksgiving was its own holiday, and the run-up to Christmas kicked off when Santa appeared at the end of the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. Even though I lost interest in the parade a long time ago, I still feel like the holiday season has gotten stretched well beyond reasonable bounds (much like U.S. political campaigns), beginning as it does weeks before Halloween.

Well, apparently now that I’m becoming old and irrelevant I need to try not to get all hung up on how things were done “back in the day”. In the spirit of compromise (considering that the display of artificial pre-lighted trees went up in Sears a month ago) I’m firing up my “Holidazed” iTunes playlist and using Thanksgiving week to start on a series of mostly holiday-related Jell-O recipes, starting with Jellied Holiday Nog.

In case you want to try it for your own holiday festivities…

This is one that I do sort of remember, mainly because of the deceptive title. I’m not a big fan of eggnog, but I’ll drink it when it’s around, and when I got to this recipe, it seemed like there was a certain logic to gelling it. I mean, it’s so thick and creamy already, you almost expect it to happen naturally; it’s kind of like a drinkable pudding.

Sure enough, Jellied Holiday Nog starts with Jell-O vanilla pudding mix and lemon Jell-O – quite a lot of both – which doesn’t sound so bad. I used the sugar-free pudding mix; unless you’re dealing with serious health issues, I don’t recommend it, because that (as well as the sugar-free Jell-O gelatins I’ve tried) tends to develop intractable lumps during the cooking process.

The combined Jell-O and pudding get mixed with a rather outlandish quantity of Dream Whip and some flavorings, making a good eight cups of Jellied Holiday Nog, which is a lot. You’re supposed to serve it with Cranberry Orange Sauce, but for some reason I opted to leave my Jellied Holiday Nog naked except for a sprinkling of nutmeg. I was probably put off by the tapioca, which I’ve never liked because the texture makes me gag unless I eat it very carefully, and the payoff for eating tapioca just isn’t worth it.

Jellied Holiday Nog á la Freak Mountain

Traditionally, eggnog doesn’t contain lemon (or any sort of citrus flavor) so it’s not surprising that I would find this too lemony.

The vanilla pudding flavor must have been pretty strong, too, because it reminded me of a dinner buffet at a restaurant in Clovis, New Mexico that I encountered while driving across the U.S. in April 1998. The buffet was traditional New Mexican, offering enchiladas with red sauce and enchiladas with green sauce, and for dessert there was a choice of “strawberry shortcake” (thawed frozen strawberries, individual-sized sponge cakes, and Cool Whip) or “banana pudding” (vanilla pudding with banana slices and Nilla wafers). I don’t know about that Cranberry Orange Sauce, but Jellied Holiday Nog could have used a side of Nilla wafers.

I gave the recipe one-to-two “nasties”, but I have absolutely no desire to make it again. That said, a major point in its favor is that it should be easy to halve in case anyone is curious to try it but doesn’t want to end up with eight cups of the stuff.

Given past failures in sharing Jell-O recipes on the holidays, I have no plans to make a Jell-O recipe for Thanksgiving – although I am mulling over taking the opportunity to make a cheese ball, something I’ve been wanting to try for a long time. I don’t think I’ve ever encountered a cheese ball in the wild, but cheese balls were among the images in my early “food porn” – the Hickory Farms holiday catalogs that started arriving in the mail in early November when I was a kid. I was intrigued by the cheese balls, and the petit-fours, tortes, and gift-box assortments, and I would just sit around poring over those catalogs. (I don’t know why we got them, because as far as I know my parents never ordered anything out of them.) I’m getting hungry just thinking about it all.

I should probably get myself a snack now. Meanwhile, I’ll leave you with this honorable, warm and emotional holiday video: