A Rum Ball Rumble

 

We made rum balls on the weekend.

 

Well, I didn’t as much as the grandkids did and I provided technical advice here and there, but it reminded me of a former work colleague who warned me of her sister’s rum balls: “Be careful, if you have one of them you will not be able to drive afterwards!”. 

 

The first time she told me I took it to be a bit of Christmas myth, but it was a yearly warning and, prompted by our current activities, I decided to look into it more closely.

 

So, how much rum is need to take you to 0.05% blood alcohol?

 

According to the the Australian Government’s Health Department , a standard drink of spirits is 30mL.

 

From my days of doing blood alcohol testing, the general guidelines for someone with a normally frisky liver was that one standard drink raised your blood alcohol by 0.01% and your liver reduced it by 0.01% an hour.  This will vary all over the paddock with weight, age and gender but will do for this discussion.

 

So, not allowing for time, you need about 150mL of rum to get to 0.05% blood alcohol.

 

So how much is in a rum ball?

 

The Australian Women’sd Weekly Classic Rum Ball Recipe uses 60mL of rum for 40 rum balls, or 1.5mL per ball.  A long way short of the 150mL needed.

 

Of course, not all rum balls are the same size.

 

If the rumball was 17cm in diameter, yes it would have enough rum to take you to 0.05% blood alcohol.

 

But it would weigh over two kilograms and have over 32,000kJ (7700 Cal). 

 

Driving would be the last thing on your mind.