To Serve Man
Rum

Hot Buttered Rum

Glass
Mug

An 18th-century New England tavern staple, dark rum, butter, and warming spices in a steaming mug.

rum classic pre-tiki hot built allspice
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Ingredients

  • brown sugar (1 tbsp)
  • unsalted butter (1 tbsp)
  • ground cinnamon
  • ground cloves
  • ground nutmeg
  • dark Jamaican rum (2 oz)
  • boiling water (6 oz)
  • nutmeg
  • cinnamon stick

Instructions

  1. In a warmed mug, combine brown sugar, unsalted butter, a pinch of ground cinnamon, a pinch of ground cloves, and a pinch of ground nutmeg.
  2. Add dark Jamaican rum and top with boiling water.
  3. Stir until the butter melts and the sugar dissolves.
  4. Grate fresh nutmeg over the top and garnish with a cinnamon stick.

Sources

  1. "Hot buttered rum." Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hot_buttered_rum (accessed 2026-05-03), surveys colonial-tavern records of hot buttered rum. The specific "butter the size of a black walnut" / "sugar the size of a hickory nut" period-measurement quotes are widely circulated in cocktail-history writing but do not appear in this particular Wikipedia article. ↩
  2. Curtis, And a Bottle of Rum (2006), colonial-rum chapter, places hot buttered rum in the 18th-century New England tavern tradition (cheap Caribbean rum + the existing buttered hot toddy) and documents the loggerhead-poker heating technique. ↩