Tiki · Party · Summer

Mai

Two rums, orange curaçao, orgeat and a lot of fresh lime. Nutty and citrus-heavy — no pineapple juice, whatever the beach bar told you.

Base: Rum
Glass: Double old fashioned glass
Method: Shake
Strength: 22% ABV

Ingredients

30 mlAmber Jamaican Rum
30 mlMartinique Molasses Rhum
15 mlOrange Curacao
15 mlOrgeat Syrup
30 mlFresh Squeezed Lime Juice1 swap
Fresh lemon juicemedium
Slightly less floral, more tart
7.5 mlSimple Syrup1 swap
Sugar syrup or agavehigh
Little change

How to make

Technique

Shake · 10–15s

Shaking chills the drink fast while adding dilution and a light texture.

Add all ingredients into a shaker with ice.
Shake and pour into a double rocks glass or an highball glass.
* The Martinique molasses rum used by Trader Vic was not an Agricole Rhum but a type of “rummy” from molasses.

Serve

Glass

Double old fashioned glassAlso fine: Old fashioned glass, Rocks glass, Tumbler

Garnish

Garnish with pineapple spear, mint leaves and lime peel.Build it tall so it clears the crushed ice.

Taste & nutrition

22%ABV

215kcal

2.76Drinks

StrengthMedium

Sweet to dryBalanced

Estimated from ingredient amounts and assumed ABVs — not a lab measurement.

Good to know

Use freshly squeezed juice — bottled tastes flat.

History

Year1944

PlaceOakland, USA

Created byVictor “Trader Vic” Bergeron

The Mai Tai was created by Victor "Trader Vic" Bergeron in 1944 in Oakland, California, and named after a Tahitian friend exclaimed "Maita'i" — meaning "the best." Aged rum, orange curaçao, orgeat and lime make up the original, with no fruit-punch clutter. It became the flagship of tiki culture and remains its most famous drink. A good one is all about quality rum.

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