Tiki bar classic Mai Tai is a classic tropical cocktail and a must for any Tiki Bartenders recipe book. Most people think of the Mai Tai as just another fruity tropical rum drink and most uninformed bar tenders serve it that way. The truth is that the history of the Mai Tai is as interesting as the classic drink is delicious.

The origins of the Mai Tai, are, like any good drinking story have several competing claims. The first claim involves the now famous Beachcomber, then a bar now a restaurant and goes back to sometime in the mid 30’s. The claim that seems to have a little more traction is that the inspiration for the Mai Tai came from Victor Bergeron and his now iconic Californian restaurant Trader Vic’s. As the story goes, in the middle of World War Two, 1944 to be exact, Victor started mixing and thought he came up with a winner. He handed his new drink to a Polynesian friend, who upon tasting this new drink, proclaimed MAI TAI…. roughly meaning “Damn That’s Good”

When made with the sometimes hard to get and top shelf original ingredients the Tiki bar classic Mai Tai takes on a whole different character than the common nondescript fruit punch drink most of us are used to being served at …. Applebee’s… God Forbid. If you really consider yourself a Tiki Bar aficionado, then you owe it to yourself to hunt down these ingredients and start mixing up tall glasses of this Tropical Cocktail classic.

Tiki bar classic Mai Tai Recipe

In a cocktail shaker add….

1 gigger…  Appleton Estate Extra dark Jamaican rum

1 gigger…  Rhum Clément VSOP Martinique rum

1/2 gigger…. orange Curacao

1/2 gigger…. a good  Orgeat

1/4 rock candy syrup

Squeeze the juice from one half of a fresh lime into the shaker and save the lime shell for garnish.

add approximately 2 to 3 cups of crushed ice

Shake well and pour into a tall glass add lime shell and a sprig of Mint