I'll drink to that

I had to go to the local post office today. In this case “local” doesn’t mean the closest post office, but the one that’s assigned to my zip code and delivers my mail. The closest is a very small office and I’m not sure that they even deliver mail — for all I know they might just have box rentals and counter service.

But that’s unimportant. I went to the post office to pick up a package. The package was from my son and contained (besides the inflated bubble packs that are so much fun to stomp) a DVD of Leverage Season 1 and a K-cup sampler.

They’re all decaf, which is good for my body, though a part of me wishes that I could still drink caffeine without upsetting my health. All in all, it was a very thoughtful gift and I’ll enjoy sampling all of those.

Coffee. It was an acquired taste. I never really liked coffee, never bothered with it, until I hit college.

Okay, so that’s one of those, “well, duh. . . Coffee is for grown-ups” moments, right?

Wrong.

Keep in mind that caffeine was not an issue when I was growing up. I drank tea. All the time. It was just one of those things.

My grandmother insisted that she was English. She was quite proud of that. Proud to the point that she dragged me out of bed in the wee hours of the morning to watch the wedding of Charles and Diana. While we were on vacation. And she was only part English: her father was of German descent.

But enough of that. Gammy drank tea and so I drank tea.

Our tea was brewed with teabags, nothing fancy, just Lipton. We drank it with milk and sugar for breakfast, usually with either toast or a cookie (see — cookie, not biscuit, therefore only part British).

Later in the day we drank iced tea, or as we called it, “ice tea.”

No, we didn’t drink it like that with the lemon slice. Instead Gammy made it with lemon juice already in it. We had to roll the lemons to soften them, cut them in half, and then use a juicer.

And then a strainer to make sure we weren’t drinking seeds.

Of course, my favorite way to drink ice tea was with mint. Gammy grew spearmint in her garden, brought it in, steeped it, and then strained the liquid into a separate jar for us to add to our tea.

She added sugar to the tea, so it was sweetened, but not like Southern-style sweet tea. Nowadays I much prefer sweet tea to my grandmother’s type, though if I’m brewing it, I use mixtures of various types of teas.

On to coffee.

In our family coffee was an adult beverage but that doesn’t mean that the kids couldn’t try it: we just didn’t like it, so why bother?

But that changed with my college years. And the Gedunk.

I just looked up that word, hoping to find photos of the Gedunk. Wikipedia tells me that a “gedunk bar” is a snack bar on a US Navy vessel. It also is the snack bar in the student union of Grove City College, as well as the name of that institution’s alumni magazine. I’ve glanced through the magazine a few times. I sat in the snack bar more than a few.

Yes, more than a few times. In fact, I think I spent more time in the Gedunk than in classes. We studied there. Studied. Do you believe that? You shouldn’t: I don’t think we ever studied there. We sat and talked and played games (some day I’ll talk about those) and smoked and drank coffee or cherry Coke and ate pizza burgers. I couldn’t find any photos of the place and it’s probably changed, but it had a huge impact on me. After all, that’s where I learned to love coffee.

I should point out that by this I mean coffee, plain and simple. Yes, I drank it with sugar and milk or cream. But it was simple coffee, not espresso or cappuccino, not Starbucks or any other brand name. Coffee.

Alright, back to childhood and drinks.

In our household, throughout the day we drank water or milk. Yes, we occasionally had juice but we were big water drinkers — when we weren’t drinking ice tea. When I went to my friend Lorrie’s house I drank Kool-Aid.

I liked going there — we didn’t drink sugary fruit-flavored drinks at my house, just sugary-lemony-tea drinks or water.

But I liked going to my friend Karen’s house even more. Why? Because her mother always had a huge pitcher of eggnog waiting for us. No rum or nutmeg, just sweet and frothy goodness. According to today’s standards, it’s a wonder we even survived. After all, it’s dangerous to eat raw eggs, right? Of course, much of what we did in those days should have killed us.

Anyhow, when I think of eggnog, that’s what comes to mind. I think that one of these days I’ll even try to make it. In preparation for that, I’ve spent some time looking around for a recipe.

EASY EGGNOG

6 eggs

3 cups milk

8 tablespoons sugar

3 teaspoons vanilla extract

1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg

In a large bowl, beat the eggs using an electric mixer.

Alternately add the sugar and the milk.

Continue beating until mixture thickens slightly.

Add vanilla extract and nutmeg.

Cover and refrigerate until chilled (at least 3 hours)

Of course, I’d leave out the nutmeg. But maybe, just maybe, it would taste like the eggnog we drank in Karen’s kitchen.

And I might also try it with coconut milk. And rum.

Oh — while I was searching for an eggnog recipe I also came across a poem, so I may as well include that as well — even though to me eggnog is a comfort food rather than a holiday treat.

If you see a fat man who’s jolly and cute

Wearing a beard and a red flannel suit

And if he is chuckling and laughing away

While flying around in a miniature sleigh

With eight tiny reindeer to pull him along

Then - let’s face it - your eggnog’s too strong!