Daiquiri

• SERVING RECOMMENDATIONS: coup or martini glass, garnish with a wedge or wheel of fresh lime perched on the rim

• BACKGROUND: The Daiquiri is a vintage cocktail that was served to the Royal Navy for centuries. It was named after the town of Daiquiri on the southeastern tip of Cuba by Jennings Cox in 1898 and brought to the US by Admiral Lucius W. Johnson. Four years later, Emilio “El Maragato” Gonzalez, a bartender at Havana’s Hotel Plaza, began serving the Daiquiri shaken and strained into a coupe glass instead of shaken and poured into an ice-filled flute. His new presentation allowed the rum to shine. In fact, it wasn’t until the 1920s that the Daiquiri went through its “vacation-style” transformation. Constantino “Constante” Ribalaigua Vert, owner of Havana bar Floridita, added shaved ice to the recipe and used a blender to create the Frozen Daiquiri. 

For our recipe, we’ve gone back to one of the classic recipes, a true celebration of the Holy Trinity of ingredients for rum drinks: rum, lime, and sugar. We use William George Rum as the base spirit, proclaimed by many rum industry insiders as the only rum for the “Perfect Daq.”