Thursday, July 9, 2009

Serving Sack


Watched a great doco on AJP Taylor today while my wee boy sucked down a bottle of food. Amazing narrative historian. It put me in a history kind of mood, so we made Posset Sack tonight for dessert. It's a runny alcoholic custard ... a traditional egg nog sort of thing. The web is full of recipes, although our variant has a bit more of a punch than some. We aim for historical accuracy only in the loosest sense.

Posset Sack
500ml trim milk (we are on a diet, you could use cream)
300ml port (or sherry or any fortified wine)
4 egg yolks
2 egg whites
cinnamon and nutmeg
1 tbsp honey (or sugar if you prefer)

Heat the milk and spices until it comes to the boil, then simmer. Don't burn the milk as it's hell to wash clean.
In a separate pot heat the port and melt in the honey. The more you heat the port, the less alcoholic the end result will be. So a light heat is recommended.
Whisk together the egg yolks and whites ... take the milk of the heat, and slowly add to the spiced milk, stirring all the while.
Place the mixture back on a gentle heat for a couple of minutes, stir.
Remove the milk mixture from the heat again and slowly add the port mixture while stirring.
Place back on a low heat and stir gently until the mixture thickens.
Serve.
Serves 2-6, depending on how greedy you are. Or just 1 if you are really greedy. Or maybe 12 if they don't really want much. I think 18 would be the limit ... beyond that and you wouldn't really get a taste. Hic!

This also gave me a chance to stick up a Sad Sack cartoon. For some reason that eludes me I had a small collection of Sad Sack comics when I was a kid. I have no idea how I got them, but I devoured them all the same. Strangely enough, I never entertained a stint in the armed forces.

1 comment:

  1. just a warning ... make sure you take the mixture OFF the heat and LET IT COOL before stirring in the various other bits. Otherwise it curdles something chronic ... not that I'd know about that.

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