Mountain Dairy Egg Nog: Bottling Up A Longtime Seasonal Tradition

STORRS, CT — Another holiday season is here and that means it's time for an eastern Connecticut tradition — Mountain Dairy egg nog in a collectible glass bottle.

Stacey Stearns, a 10th-generation member of the Mountain Dairy founding family, said egg nog time is always a festive time around the farm. The farm has been serving up milk since 1871 and the egg nog bottle tradition began in the mid 1990s, she said.

It's also part of the vintage milk truck home delivery system revived in 2020 after an eight-year lapse and places to buy the egg nog can be searched via the dairy farm's store locator system. Two popular stores are the Big Ys in Mansfield and Tolland. Several smaller stores in Tolland County also carry Mountain Dairy products.

"It has a lot of fans," she said.

Speaking of the vintage milk truck, the truck is the design for this year's commemorative bottle. Last year's bottle featured a barn.

"It's a different bottle every year," Stearns said. "And our biggest fans don't miss a year. Some homes in the area have the complete collection on display every year for the holidays"

Stearns said the bottles needed to complete collections have even shown up at online auction sites.

The milk truck design was fashioned by another 10th-generation family member — Nicole Stearns.

Stacey Stearns said the secret egg nog recipe is locked in a safe place.

"It's like the Bush's Beans recipe, maybe only the dog knows it," she said with a laugh.

She continued, "Seriously, only a few people know it."

In 1871 Jared Stearns began selling milk to his neighbors and friends in the local community. A generation later, hard times hit with the beginning of the Great Depression and the farm's future was threatened. The Stearns family, though returned the farm to prosperity.

Mountain Dairy gradually acquired all of the equipment needed to pasteurize, homogenize, and bottle milk from its own cows. During a time period when small dairy farmers were increasingly being forced to sell their milk to large processors, Mountain Dairy resisted the trend, becoming self-sufficient in the production and marketing of its own milk.

One thing Stearns did divulge about the egg not was that is starts with whole milk from the farm's cows and a method called High Temperature Short Time Pasteurization, or HTST.

"The process does help preserve the flavor," she said.

How long does the supply of glass bottles last?

"They may go quickly," she said.

But fans of the flavor can have no fear. The egg nog also comes in plastic bottles.

"We will have plenty," Stearns said.

For pricing and ordering, go the Mountain Dairy website.