mardi gras

BUTTERY RUM MARDI GRAS GOODNESS—For you, MFI, not the angels, your kids, or the pope

My Fellow Inebriates,

For those of you still eating solid foods, here’s a fantastic way to include alcohol in your Mardi Gras pancakes:

YUMMY BUTTER-RUM PANCAKES

  • 1 cup maple syrup (or, if your kids go through it fast enough to bankrupt you, no-name fake syrup like the kind at LBHQ)

  • 2 tbsp butter

  • 4 tbsp rum (or whisky/bourbon/vodka, etc.)

  • Pancakes (optional)

Here goes…

In a small saucepan, heat the syrup and butter, stirring until the butter melts. Then REMOVE AND LET SIT FOR 5 MINUTES while your mother finishes making pancakes or whatever the hell she’s doing.

THIS IS CRITICAL!!! YOU DO NOT WANT THE SYRUP TO BE TOO HOT WHEN YOU ADD THE LIQUOR. YOU DO NOT WANT ONE PRECIOUS MOLECULE TO EVAPORATE. DO NOT GIVE THE ANGELS A SHARE*—WHAT HAVE THEY DONE FOR YOU LATELY ANYWAY?

After five minutes, stir your chosen booze in.

Okay, so now you have a delicious, buttery, booze-enhanced syrup. DO NOT GIVE IT TO THE KIDS—WHAT HAVE THEY DONE FOR YOU LATELY ANYWAY?

And finally, drink the syrup straight pour your syrup over your Mardi Gras feast. Ahhhhhh!!!

Dan Lacey's painting of then-Cardinal Ratzinger wearing pancake vestments

Dan Lacey’s painting of then-Cardinal Ratzinger wearing pancake vestments

*an·gels’ share (njlz)
n. Informal
The quantity of an alcoholic liquor lost to evaporation during the distilling process.

Incorporating alcohol into your Mardi Gras feast

My Fellow Inebriates,

It’s a no-brainer to write about pancakes today. My mum is whipping some questionable ones up right now for the kids and probably asking herself if she could get away with feeding them pancakes all day instead of stepping up and providing the nutritional diversity that parents typically do.

Solid foods don’t do it for me, but syrup is another story—when it contains rum. Here’s what my mum isn’t doing for the kids this morning (just in case Child Services is reading this):

  • Pancakes (you know, throw a bunch of flour, milk and stuff together)
  • 2 cups maple syrup (we just have the fake stuff but it will work)
  • ¼ butter
  • ¼ rum

Melt the butter in a saucepan. Add the syrup and stir until the mixture is hot. Then [IMPORANT] remove from heat BEFORE adding the rum. You do NOT want any alcohol to burn off.

In fact, if you are concerned about alcohol burning off, you should add MORE rum.

In fact, if you are REALLY concerned about alcohol burning off, you should forgo the syrup/butter step and just POUR RUM on your pancakes.

And if you are EVEN MORE concerned about alcohol burning off, you should just forget about the pancakes and drink the rum. While contemplating some art.

By Dan Lacey: Hoda Kotb and Kathie Lee Gifford wrestle nude, on a pancake