What rum do I need for tiki cocktails?

More than one, which is the whole trick. A Jamaican rum for funk and a demerara for weight will cover most of these; a light rum as a third fills the gaps. Tiki recipes blend rums deliberately, so pouring a single bottle into a Mai Tai never quite gets there.

Do I really need crushed ice?

For most of these, yes. Crushed ice chills and dilutes faster than cubes, and these drinks are built expecting that dilution. Without it they arrive sweet and hot. A tea towel and a rolling pin will do the job if you have not got a crusher.

What is orgeat and can I buy it?

An almond syrup, usually made with rose and orange blossom water, and it is what makes a Mai Tai taste like a Mai Tai. You can buy it, and the shop-bought stuff is mostly sugar and almond flavouring. Ours takes an afternoon and is worth it.

Rum, citrus, spice, crushed ice

Tiki & tropical

The most technically demanding drinks in the canon, dressed up as the least serious. Tiki is layered rum, fresh citrus, house syrups and a great deal of crushed ice — and it rewards precision more than almost anything else here.

Recipes here

Guides to go with them

Where it came from

Two men in 1930s California, mostly. Don the Beachcomber and Trader Vic built an entire style on blended rums, fresh juice and spiced syrups, then guarded the recipes so fiercely that some were written in code and handed to bartenders as numbered mixes. Much of what was lost has only been reconstructed in the last twenty years.

None of it is Polynesian, whatever the decor claims. It is Caribbean ingredients filtered through American showmanship — and the drinks are extraordinary regardless of the fiction wrapped around them.

What makes a tiki drink work

Three things, and none of them is the garnish. Blended rum, because no single bottle gives you both funk and weight. Fresh citrus, always squeezed that day. And real syrups — orgeat, falernum, passion fruit — which is why so many of these recipes send you to a guide before they send you to a shaker.

Then the ice. Crushed ice is not decoration here; it is the fourth ingredient. It chills hard and dilutes fast, which is exactly what a drink carrying this much rum and sugar needs to come into balance. Serve one of these over a big cube and it will taste like syrup.

Pour one

14 tiki & tropical recipes

All recipes →

Tropical

Make the other half yourself

The syrups these drinks keep asking for

Cream of Coconut →Demerara Syrup →Grenadine →Orgeat →Passion Fruit Syrup →Simple Syrup →

Asked and answered

Questions, answered

What rum do I need for tiki cocktails?: More than one, which is the whole trick. A Jamaican rum for funk and a demerara for weight will cover most of these; a light rum as a third fills the gaps. Tiki recipes blend rums deliberately, so pouring a single bottle into a Mai Tai never quite gets there.
Do I really need crushed ice?: For most of these, yes. Crushed ice chills and dilutes faster than cubes, and these drinks are built expecting that dilution. Without it they arrive sweet and hot. A tea towel and a rolling pin will do the job if you have not got a crusher.
What is orgeat and can I buy it?: An almond syrup, usually made with rose and orange blossom water, and it is what makes a Mai Tai taste like a Mai Tai. You can buy it, and the shop-bought stuff is mostly sugar and almond flavouring. Ours takes an afternoon and is worth it.

The bartender’s note

One drink, one story, one bottle worth buying.

Thursday evening, so you have time to shop. No more than that.

Tiki & tropical

Where it came from

What makes a tiki drink work

14 tiki & tropical recipes

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The syrups these drinks keep asking for

Questions, answered

One drink, one story, one bottle worth buying.