How to Make a Mai Tai Fit for a Tropical Vacation

This sweet rum-based drink is a classic for a reason.

By Thrillist Food

Updated on 4/22/2022 at 12:57 PM

mai tai cocktail cocktails recipe rum sweet tropical drinks recipe
Alp Aksoy/Shutterstock

For decades, Vic Bergeron swore up and down that the Mai Tai was invented in 1944 at his Northern California restaurant, Trader Vic’s. And that was that. Until it wasn’t.

You see, there’s also a case to be made that Bergeron’s good friend and business rival Ernest Raymond Beaumont Gantt, better known as Don the Beachcomber, invented it in 1933.

Bergeron and Gantt have both long since moved on to the Great Tiki Bar in the Sky, leaving the matter unsettled for all eternity. But we actually find that fitting. The Mai Tai is the granddaddy of tiki-style cocktails, and an enduring symbol of the carefree island spirit. And nothing says “relax” like a story you can’t fact-check.

Mai Tai

FLAVOR PROFILE
Sweet, Sour
STRENGTH
DIFFICULTY
intermediate

INGREDIENTS

  • 1 oz Jamaican Rum
  • 1 oz Rhum Agricole
  • .75 oz lime juice
  • .5 oz Curaçao
  • .5 oz Orgeat
  • Crushed Ice
  • mint

INSTRUCTIONS

Step one

Shake all ingredients in a shaker tin.

Step two

Strain with a Hawthorne strainer into a rocks glass.

Step three

Garnish with a pressed lime hull (from juicing a lime) and a large bouquet of mint.

Contributed by Supercall