The Anna Maria Island Sun Newspaper

Vol. 11 No. 29 - April 20, 2011

FEATURE

Setting fire to dessert

 

Anna Maria Island Sun News Story

Bananas Foster

Uncle George put rum in everything. His beans were particularly lethal.

He got the beans and pork and brown sugar going in a huge iron crock on the stove and loaded in the rum. Then he built a hard wood fire in a hole in the yard. When the fire turned to coals he took the cast iron pot from the stove and put it in the hole and covered it with gravel and sand. The pot would bake all day and then cool through the night and be ready the next morning.

Losing the rum's alcohol in the cooking always irritated George. It seemed a terrible waste.

The last time he cooked beans he decided to try to seal the alcohol in by wrapping the crock in a space age aluminum blanket he had bought to keep warm at hockey games. He sealed it all up with duct tape and put it in the hole with the red hot coals.

George washed down all the cooking and digging with a couple of beers. The beers necessitated taking a leak through the fence into McGillicuddy's yard. George and McGillicuddy had been scrapping all their lives. He and McGillicuddy were forever peeing back and forth through the fence.

When the beans exploded, the blast scared the bejeezuz out of George. He zipped up real fast and caught a bit of his equipment in the zipper. No amount of cussing or jiggling could get him uncaught.

Reluctantly, George called Cousin Mike the doctor. Doctor Mike is in charge of the emergency room at the hospital.

Doctor Mike called about a dozen cousins over to the house to inspect George's condition and consult on a course of action. After some rum-sipping and muffled chuckling they resolved to transport Uncle George to the Emergency Room by ambulance. Because of the sensitive nature of his condition, Cousin Tommy, the police sergeant, called in a couple of squad cars to act as escort.

Uncle George and his zippered appliance moved off in a parade of sirens and flashing lights and horn-hooting cousins.

When George finally got to the hospital Cousin Mike had arranged a greeting by about 30 hospital employees. Cousin Tommy the cop had notified the press.

Uncle George was extracted from the zipper.

The moral of the story is to be careful when cooking with alcohol, particularly when making….

Bananas Foster

Melt two heaping tablespoons of butter in a pan with about the same amount of brown sugar.

Add a couple of ounces of low octane banana liqueur and stir it into the mixture. Add the bananas. Pull the contents toward the handle and heat the far high side of the pan. Remove the pan from the flame and pour in about two ounces of 151 rum.

Bring the pan back across the flame and - poof - ooohhh!!! - a three foot flame will leap from the pan. Carefully ease a tablespoon of cinnamon sugar low into the flame across the edge of the pan – and sprinkle carefully. The cinnamon will sparkle up into the flame – ahhhh.

Spoon the mixture onto vanilla or ginger ice cream.

The fruit can be any tropical fruit - pineapple, mango - and ginger ice cream adds a little kick.'

Check the prevailing wind before you start and be careful to remove the pan from the flame when adding the booze. If you don't add the liquor well away from the flame it can jump into the bottle and your trip to the Emergency Room might not end as well as Uncle George's.


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