Pavlova Pavlova-It's a great dessert for Christmas because it can be made well ahead Pavlova is a meringue-based dessert named after the Russian ballerina Anna Pavlova.[1] It is a meringue dessert with a crisp crust and soft, light inside, usually topped with fruit and, optionally, whipped cream The Pav (short for Pavlova used in New Zealand and Australia) is popular on Christmas Day as a dessert usually served after being refrigerated due to Christmas being celebrated during the summer in the southern hemisphere EGGNOG The word "eggnog" provides a keyhole glimpse into the drink's history, 'nog was "a strong variety of beer" to English drinkers around Norfolk (The possibly related Shetlandic word "nugg" referred to "ale warmed with a hot poker.") The word "noggin" refers to your head, but also, in places like Ireland even today, to "a small drinking vessel." Eggnog itself is a drink of eggs, dairy, sugar, and (historically) alcohol The English have been mixing eggnog for several hundred years, and the drink crossed the Atlantic with the early American colonists Journals and diaries from back then reveal that eggnog was a Christmas tradition What is less clear is how drink and holiday met, hit it off, and stayed together One can guess The ingredients for eggnog are available year-round, but could you imagine drinking a cream-based brew with the viscosity of syrup and then heading out to plow a farm in summer? It makes much more sense that colonial Americans would’ve waited until winter, for an occasion worthy of breaking out the spirits (if scarce) — for Christmas, a time when the harvest was done and there wasn’t much to but celebrate Why we drink eggnog at Christmas? Maybe history Maybe tradition Maybe to fire the memory or to point the mind down a pleasant vector and press launch Maybe to get full Maybe to get drunk Maybe for the same reason we anything in December And maybe, yes — maybe even for taste