I disagree with T.S. Eliot. April is not the cruelest month. February takes the cake.
Just as you round the corner of January, plowing through bone-chilling days and post-holiday bills, you’re smacked in the face with another full month of winter.
Some lucky few slip away for a week of warm weather vacation. I can’t escape to the tropics. So I do my best to bring the tropics to me—with the help of a cocktail shaker. This Classic Shaken Mai Tai Cocktail, with its exotic mix of potent liquors, makes the perfect winter restorative.
Mai Tais often get a bad rap, perhaps because drinkers’ first taste of the cocktail comes from a pink, acidic bottled mix.
Real-deal Mai Tais use fresh fruit juice, rum, a citrusy liqueur—triple sec in my recipe—simple syrup and orgeat, an Italian almond-flavored syrup.
Be sure to measure and mix Mai Tai ingredients carefully: Add more than a splash of simple syrup and you wind up K O’d with a very alcoholic but cloyingly sweet Hawaiian Punch.
Bartenders guard Mai Tai formulas—and contest their authenticity—fiercely. One website lists 14 recipes, several claiming to be the original, only, or real Mai Tai mix.
For me, one mixologist’s opinion matters more than any other: My Twitter friend, Noelle Chun—Evangelist/Content Manager at Alltop, Social Media Coordinator at Ashoka’s Changemakers, collector of classic cocktail recipes and blogger at The Joy of Drinking.
Given Noelle’s encyclopedic knowledge of cocktails in general—and Mai Tai cocktails in particular—with a trembling hand I mix and offer this…
Classic Shaken Mai Tai Cocktail Recipe
For each cocktail you’ll need:
2 ounces golden rum
1/2 ounce Triple Sec
1/2 ounce orgeat
1/4 ounce lemon simple syrup, see recipe, below
Juice of one lime, strained
Cracked ice
Measure and pour liquors, syrups and juice into a cocktail shaker. Add a handful of cracked ice. Cover shaker and agitate vigorously until shaker begins to frost on the outside. Strain and pour Mai Tai into a lowball glass. Garnish with a slice of lime.
Lemon Simple Syrup recipe
1 cup sugar
Juice and zest of one lemon
Water to fill one-cup measure when added to lemon juice
- Pour the sugar into a small saucepan.
- Grate lemon zest and add to the sugar.
- Juice the lemon and pour juice into a measuring cup. Add enough water to make one cup. Pour lemon juice/water into the saucepan with the sugar and lemon zest.
- Over a medium flame, stir mixture and bring to a boil. Lower flame and simmer until sugar is dissolved—about 1-2 minutes. Turn off flame and allow syrup to cool.
- Strain syrup, pour into a jar, cover with lid and store in refrigerator.
