Homemade McDonald's-Style Eggnog Shake Recipe

A simpler (and boozier) approach to a favorite McDonald's holiday treat.

By
Stella Parks
Stella Parks
Stella Parks
Editor Emeritus
Stella Parks is a CIA-trained baking nerd and pastry wizard, dubbed one of America's Best New Pastry Chefs by Food & Wine. She was the pastry editor at Serious Eats from 2016 to 2019.
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Updated April 18, 2024
A DIY McDonald's egg nog milkshake, topped with whipped cream and a maraschino cherry in a glass holiday cup, on a red background.

Serious Eats / Sarah Jane Sanders

Why It Works

  • Chopped nutmeg, cinnamon, and Frangelico give the shake a subtly spiced and nutty flavor.
  • Partially churned ice cream base is folded into whipped cream for the perfect fluffy, yet drinkable, texture.

When, exactly, did the holidays come unmoored? Halloween starts encroaching when September still hasn't quite shed her hot days and Thanksgiving pilgrims pop up just as we've started to put a dent in our Trick or Treat stash. Saint Nick used to hold off 'til the night before Christmas but now his reindeer come prancing out long before Tom Turkey, with McDonald's Eggnog shake in tow.

Maybe it's the PTSD (that's Post Thanksgiving Sobriety Disinclination) talking, but any dessert that can accommodate a few ounces bourbon seems like the very definition of Happy Holidays to me.

Not that McDonald's Egg Nog shake is alcoholic. Just that, well, it should be. And hey, at least I had the decency to wait until December actually rolled around to get my Christmas Spirit on.

While eggnog recipes vary widely from household to household and formulas for the store bought variety shift by brand and region, Ronald McDonald's miracle of factory-formulated holiday cheer tastes the same from coast to coast.

None can say when Mickey D's first debuted their eggnog shake. In Politically Correct Holiday Stories for an Enlightened Yuletide, published in 1995, James Garner suggests someone "be force-fed 100 McDonald's eggnog shakes" as a punishment for a crime beyond the scope of my Google Books preview. For it to have gained enough notoriety to constitute a known threat, one must assume a debut no later than, say, 1994.

In my memory, the eggnog shake looked like any other shake, but in a paper cup printed with holiday designs. Today's version has been McCafe'd within an inch of its life, encased in a clear, Starbuckian vessel. It's capped with a thick head of "whipped cream" and a maraschino cherry glowing brightly enough to put Rudolph outta business. According to the McDonald website, it contains no fewer than thirteen ingredients. To be clear, I'm talking about the cherry on top, not the shake itself.

Meanwhile, it takes no fewer than sixteen ingredients to make the whipped topping (shockingly, cream among them). Which brings us to 29 assorted sugars, preservatives, stabilizers, flavorings and colorants and we haven't even addressed what goes into the shake itself. Oh no, friends. McDonald's won't tell you what happens there, other than to hint that the eggnog shake may threaten those allergic to eggs.

To develop an eggnog shake of my own (with fewer ingredients than you'd find in a McDonald's cherry), I started with my Dairy Queen Blizzard recipe. Yes, I know. The sacrilege. Next, I doubled the yolks to put the egg into the 'nog. But spicing it proved a little trickier; straight up nutmeg tasted too simple compared to the real thing.

The McDonald's shake does taste primarily of nutmeg, but with a complicated, (chemical?) nuance of miscellaneous holiday spice. Complicated in that reverse-engineered-to-taste-like-plain-old-nutmeg sort of way. To approach this at home, I used chopped rather than ground or grated nutmeg. This yields a gentle nutmeg flavor which I further rounded out by briefly steeping cinnamon into the dairy. Finally, a shot of Frangelico adds that vaguely nutty nuance I think a McDonald's shake must absorb from the paper cups.

This base gets half churned in an ice cream maker to thicken it, then folded into whipped cream, for a spot-on McShake texture: slightly fluffy and with more body than melted ice cream, but thin enough to suck up a straw. The flavor screams Happy Holidays with or without a shot of something stronger mixed in at the end.

I'm loving it.

December 2011

Recipe Details

Homemade McDonald's-Style Eggnog Shake Recipe

Cook 75 mins
Active 45 mins
Chilling/Churning Time 6 hrs 15 mins
Total 7 hrs 30 mins
Makes 4 shakes

Ingredients

  • 12 ounces whole milk
  • 8 ounces heavy cream
  • 1 Tahitian vanilla bean, split and scraped; seeds reserved
  • 1 cinnamon stick, about 3" long
  • 3 whole nutmegs, roughly chopped
  • 3 ounces egg yolks (from about 5 eggs)
  • 7 ounces sugar
  • 3/4 teaspoon salt
  • 2 ounces Frangelico (see notes)
  • 1/2 Tbsp vanilla extract
  • Whipped Cream Mix-In/Topping:
  • 12 ounces whipped cream
  • 2 ounces brown sugar
  • Optional: 4 maraschino cherries

Directions

  1. Prepare Shake Base: In a medium pot, bring milk and cream to a simmer together with vanilla bean, cinnamon and nutmeg. When mixture begins to simmer, shut off heat and cover with a lid. Steep for one hour.

    Meanwhile put egg yolks in a medium bowl and whisk sugar in gradually. It's a lot of sugar, so don't dump it in all at once or it will be difficult to incorporate. Whisk in salt.

    Return dairy to a simmer and remove vanilla bean and spices. Use a spatula to scrape out heavily flavored cream from inside vanilla pod.

    Now whisk hot cream into egg yolks, one ladle-full at a time, until egg mixture is quite warm. Then whisk egg mixture into pot of cream. Turn heat to medium low. Stir constantly with a rubber spatula, making sure to scrape all along the bottom of the pot to avoid curdling.

  2. Normally, ice cream recipes entreat you to cook until mixture is "thick enough to coat the back of a wooden spoon," but with this recipe, that's harder to judge. Instead, cook until a thermometer registers 145° F (63°C). When it does, immediately shut off heat and strain custard through a sieve and into a large bowl. Stir in Frangelico and vanilla extract. Cool in an ice bath and refrigerate, covered, until thoroughly chilled; about six hours.

    When ready, process chilled ice cream base in ice cream maker just until it begins to thicken. Remember, a proper milkshake is made by blending ice cream with milk; we're cutting straight to the chase by just churning until the base takes on a shake-like texture. Exactly how long this takes will vary from maker to maker, but in my machine that's about 15 minutes.

  3. Finishing the Shake:

    While the shake base is churning, combine brown sugar and whipped cream in a medium bowl. Whip with a hand or stand mixer on medium speed until cream holds stiff peaks. Use a rubber spatula to transfer about four ounces to a pastry bag, fitted with a large star tip. Set aside.

    Now shut off ice cream maker and pour or scoop thickened base into bowl of whipped cream. Fold gently with a rubber spatula to combine. If you'd like to add some extra booze, now would be the time.

    Pour shake into four glasses and top each with a swirl of whipped cream and a maraschino cherry. Add a straw and enjoy!

Special Equipment

Ice cream maker, mixer, pastry bag, large star tip

Notes

Two ounces of Frangelico split four ways isn't enough booze to get the party started, if you know what I mean. At any rate, I didn't include it for for its alcohol, but for its slightly nutty flavor that matches the odd aftertaste found in McDonald's Egg Nog shake. If you don't consume alcohol, replace it with an extra two ounces of milk plus 1/4 teaspoon almond extract; it'll get the job done.

If you do consume alcohol, feel free to mix in a shot or two of your favorite holiday spirit along with the whipped cream at the end. Add it earlier and you'll prevent the shake from thickening in the ice cream maker.

All measurements are in weights, as volume measures can be very imprecise. I strongly recommend using a scale for all pastry projects.

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