Rum cocktails

Recipes for top cocktails with rum, from the Mojito and the Piña colada to the classic Rum Punch.

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While you can get away with one gin in your cocktail cabinet and at a push one whiskey, to make all the great rum-based cocktails out there, you need a minimum of two bottles, ideally more. To start, make sure you have a good Cuban-style white rum. Despite being colourless, these are usually aged in wood and then filtered to remove the colour. Then you’ll need a good aged rum. Beware some dark rums aren’t aged, they are just coloured so make sure it’s one that has spent a good load of time in wood. You could go for the smooth taste of a Latin American rum or the funky flavours of Jamaica but we think Barbados is a good compromise if you’ve only got space for one aged rum.

The trouble with rum is that once you start, it’s hard to know when to stop. There’s Navy rum and some brilliant spiced rums out there (technically spirit drinks); many tiki cocktails call for a high strength overproof rum and you’ll need some Cachaça from Brazil to make a proper Caipirinha. That’s before you get on to the wild flavours of rhum agricole from the French-speaking Caribbean. Like Cachaça, these are made with sugar cane juice rather than molasses. And these are just rums from the Americas. What about Thai, Mauritian, Madeiran or even Scottish rum? There’s a wide world of rum to explore.

Mojito

The key to making a good Mojito is to gently bruise the mint rather than grinding it into a mushy pulp. It’s such a great cocktail because you can make it with pretty much any rum but we think it’s particularly good with a pungent rhum agricole or a fresh botanical rum.

Ingredients:

60ml Rum

Half a fresh lime, cut in 4 or 6 parts (or use 15ml lime juice)

15ml Sugar syrup

Mint leaves, about 15

Sparkling water to top

Method:

In a Highball glass gently muddle the limes, mint leaves and syrup. Add the rum, fill the glass two thirds full with crushed ice and stir vigorously. Top with sparkling water and stir again gently. Add more crushed ice, until the glass is filled to the brim, and garnish with a mint sprig.

Piña colada

You can make your piña colada as rich or light as you like. Some recipes call for coconut cream and whole pineapple, and then you blend it with ice to make a sort of alcoholic smoothie. This is a lighter version made in a cocktail shaker with a squeeze of lime to freshen it up.

Ingredients:

50ml Rum or coconut rum

50ml Coconut milk

100ml Fresh pineapple juice

Juice of half a lime

Method:

Add all the ingredients to an ice-filled shaker. Shake hard and strain into a tumbler or Collins glass filled with ice. Garnish with a slice of lime or pineapple. And, what the hell, a glace cherry, umbrella and sparkler too.

Daiquiri

For many the Daiquiri is the ultimate rum cocktail. Nowadays if you order one in its home country of Cuba, you’ll usually get something made with crushed ice. There are all kinds of variations on the Daiquiri but if you want the original order a Daiquiri Naturale. Here’s how you make it.

Ingredients:

50ml White rum

15ml Lime juice

10 ml Sugar syrup

Method:

Shake ingredients with plenty of ice and double strain into a chilled Martini glass. Serve with a wedge of lime.

Mai Tai

It’s tiki time! This cocktail was invented by the godfather of tiki, that strange mash-up of Polynesian, Californian and Chinese cultures, by Trader Vic aka, Victor Jules Bergeron Jr in the 1940s. It would have originally been made with Wray & Nephew 17 year old from Jamaican rum which is no longer available so use something aged and punchy from Jamaica, Barbados or Trinidad. A smooth Cuban rum won’t quite cut it.

Ingredients:

40ml Aged rum

25ml Lime juice

10ml Orgeat syrup

10ml Orange Curaçao

Method:

Shake the ingredients with ice until a frost forms on the outside of the shaker. Fill a tiki cup (or Old Fashioned glass) with ice cubes and strain the mixture over. Garnish with a lime quarter and a sprig of mint.

Caipirinha

The Caipirinha is the national drink of Brazil so it’s worth using Cachaça, the country’s own distinctive-tasting rum that’s made with sugar cane juice rather than molasses. If you don’t have it, a white Cuban rum would do at a push but a pungent rhum agricole would be even better.

Ingredients:

50ml Cachaça

1tbsp Sugar

1 Lime, sliced in half lengthwise and cut into quarters or eighths

Method:

In a double rocks glass, combine the lime segments with the sugar and use a muddler to gently crush and squeeze the limes. Add the cachaça and stir well. Add crushed ice and stir. Serve immediately with a slice of lime to garnish.

Rum Punch

The rum punch is one of the oldest and most versatile drinks out there. The word is thought to have come from an Indian word ‘panch’ meaning five for the number of ingredients, though this etymology has been disputed. True or not, five ingredients is a good way to think about the flavours of your punch. In the Caribbean they have a saying to help: “one of sour, two of sweet, three of strong and four of weak”.

Ingredients:

60ml Rum (ideally Jamaican)

60ml Chilled water

30ml Sugar syrup

15ml Lime juice

4 Dashes Angostura bitters

Method:

Put the rum, bitters, lime juice, water and sugar syrup in a cocktail shaker and add some ice cubes. Shake and strain into two ice-filled Collins glasses. Decorate with whatever you have to hand, orange, pineapple or lime slices, and perhaps a sprig of mint.

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