Cocktail #40: Siboney

I just realized the other day that about one year has passed since I embarked on this little project. And here I am, only 40 cocktails in after 52 weeks. So it goes. I guess I need to pick up the pace!

The Siboney. Fresh Passion Fruit Syrup Makes this Drink

This week we have a very simple cocktail that's easy to make and very accessible -- and is now one of my new favorites. I found it in Jeff Berry's Potions of the Caribbean and he credits it back to Trader Vic, circa 1950s, but found in The Trader's 1974 book, Rum Cookery & Drinkery. Berry notes that the Siboney "is a good example of how Trader Vic took the Daiquiri template in interesting directions--and how he kept the inventory down at his bar. Double to Siboney, add a dash of Angostura bitters, and serve over crushed ice in a pilsner glass; now you have the Trader Vic Grog."

This cocktail contains passion fruit syrup, and readers of this blog will be familiar with my bad luck/incorrect use of Monin Passion Fruit Syrup. Well, this week I decided to bite the bullet on some expensive passion fruits at the shop and make my own. There's tons of recipes out there for this stuff, and Berry and Cate have their own variations that use passion fruit puree (which, for me has been harder to find than passion fruit), so I landed on this one from Episurious.com, which I halved:

1 cup water

1 cup sugar

1/2 cup passion fruit pulp (from about 7 ripe passion fruits)

Combine all ingredients in heavy small saucepan. Bring to boil over medium-high heat, stirring until sugar dissolves. Reduce heat to low; simmer until syrup is reduced to 1 1/2 cups, about 15 minutes. Transfer to bowl, cover, and chill. (Can be made 2 days ahead. Keep chilled.)

I added about an ounce of vodka to what I had leftover hoping to make this keep for a couple weeks.

Anyway, WHAT A DIFFERENCE THIS MADE! Instead of being totally overpowering, the fresh passion fruit syrup gave this just a hint of what the Monin stuff would have done with a similar amount. It was subtle and delicious, and didn't hit you over the head at all. I'm tempted to dump the Monin stuff down the drain after tasting a cocktail with the real McCoy.

To make a Siboney:

1.00 oz. dark Jamaican rum (I used Plantation)
0.50 oz. fresh lemon juice
0.50 oz. unsweetened pineapple juice
0.50 oz. passion fruit syrup

Shake well with ice cubes. Strain into a tiki-stemmed (or regular old coupe) cocktail glass. I garnished with a slice of lime.

As I said, the verdict for this cocktail for me was fabulous - a new favorite! The most present flavor is pineapple when you first sip, followed by the rum and passion fruit. The lemon juice takes the edge off of the sweetless of the passion fruit syrup, and balances it all very nicely.

This is a cocktail I will undoubtedly come back to again and again this summer. Next time I might reduce the pineapple juice by a hair to let a bit more of the rum shine through, but all in all, this one's a keeper.

Cheers, and happy spring!

Cocktail #6: Tonga Zombie

I'm a couple days late this week due to having guests in town over the weekend, so happy Tiki Tuesday!

This week we have the Tonga Zombie, from Jeff Berry's Intoxica!  This recipe is based on the Zombie recipe from the Tonga Room, a fabulous tiki bar inside the Fairmont Hotel in San Francisco, c. 1945. Despite what seems like constant rumors of its demise, as of today, the Tonga Room is still open. I've been lucky enough to go there a few times and it's incredible. It has a pond with a floating bandstand, and every so often there's a "thunderstorm" inside - it thunders and lightnings, and rain pours down into the pond. The atmosphere is absolutely incredible.

(photo via tikiloungetalk.com)

 Anyway, back to the recipe:

1.00 oz. fresh lime juice
0.50 oz. unsweetened pineapple juice
1.00 oz. passion fruit syrup
1.00 oz. white Puerto Rican rum (I used Cruzan, a light Virgin Islands rum)
0.50 oz. dark Jamaican rum (I used Myers's)
0.50 oz Bacardi 151 rum (I used Don Q 151)

Shake all ingredients with one cup of crushed ice. Pour into a chimney glass, adding more crushed ice to fill. I garnished mine with a maraschino cherry speared to lemon and lime wheels using a flamingo pick, a pineapple wedge, and a pineapple leaf. I also recently picked up some bamboo paper straws which are both biodegradable and really cool looking.

On the first sip, honestly I was a bit overwhelmed by the passion fruit syrup - if I made this again, I might cut that in half. But once the ice melted a bit and things melded a little, it got less overwhelming. It packs a bit of a punch, but the booze factor is not over the top. Otherwise, it's a classic exotic cocktail - a little sweet, a little sour, and a little boozy. Nice and refreshing, and excellent to look at.

I've been in a bit of an Elvis mood lately, so tonight I leave you with -- what else -- Elvis' classic, Blue Hawaii. Cheers!

Cocktail #2: The Royal Hawaiian

This week's cocktail may be a departure for many people who have come to expect rum in their tiki drinks (I was one of them!). Also, it's incredibly easy to make with relatively easy-to-find ingredients (the orgeat being the most obscure, but even that is getting easier to find these days). The recipe is as follows:

1.5 oz. pineapple juice
0.5 oz. fresh lemon juice
1 teaspoon of orgeat syrup
1.5 oz. gin

Add all the ingredients to a cocktail shaker that's filled halfway with ice, and shake vigorously. Strain into a chilled cocktail glass. I've chosen to garnish mine with a lemon slice and maraschino cherry speared by an umbrella.

This is the first time I've tried this cocktail, and I quite enjoyed it. I'm a sucker for sour - which this drink is - but even if you're not, the lemon is not overpowering here, as it's tempered by the sweetness of the pineapple juice, and orgeat. The drink will form a thin layer of sweet foam on the top, which is really nice before the more sour liquid beneath hits you.

Beachbum Berry has a short history of this cocktail:

"From the Moana Hotel, Honolulu, Hawaii, circa 1948. Webley Edwards' then-famous radio program Hawaii Calls, featuring the Singing Surfriders and the Waikiki Maidens, was often broadcast live from the Banyan Court of the Moana; up to 3,000 middle aged tourists at a time would pack the courtyard to hear Edwards open the show with his trademark 'Aloha,' to which the crowd would always respond, 'a-LO-ha!'"

As you mix up  your own Royal Hawaiian, throw on these Webley Edwards records from YouTube:






Cheers, and enjoy!