Zombie
It's time for another Tiki drink and an absolute legend at that!
Created by Don the Beachcomber, the creator of Tiki, it's a cocktail with a lot of bullshit recipes around.
Ya see, Don had a strong competitor named Trader Vic. Don was absolutely convinced that Vic's absolute smash hit cocktail, the Mai Tai, was a copy of his Q.B. Cooler.
It is not known if that's the case or not. Nobody has any proof of the Q.B. Cooler existing before the Mai Tai and Trader Vic's story of how he invented it is, like most barkeeper stories about their cocktails, likely absolute bullshit.
Whenever a barkeeper is asked about a legendary cocktail they invented, you get the same story. Someone ordered something along the lines of "make me something special" and they just threw some stuff together and struck gold.
That is a tradition that goes back to Jerry Thomas, arguably the inventor of the modern bar drinks. So to the very late 19th to early 20th century. Nobody ever admits to trial and error and refinement. It's always a story like that.
Same goes for the Zombie, of course, which Don threw together for a pal that had a few too many drinks the day before and wanted something strong to kill the hangover.
These days, you'd get a Bloody Mary. But Don ran a Tiki bar. He wouldn't make a fucking Bloody Mary. After all, his bar had something like fifty different bottles of rum but no vodka.
However, since Don was absolutely paranoid about his recipe being stolen, everything was secret.
Ingredients were prepared by Don beforehand and just got numbered labels. So even his barkeeps would only have a list of "1 ounce of #5, 1.5 ounces of #3" and so on.
Don's personal notebooks have since been found and thanks to that, we actually now know what "Don's Mix" for example is, which is also required for a Zombie.
We need:
45ml of aged Jamaican Rum
45ml of aged Puerto Rican Rum
30ml of overproof Demarara Rum
22.5ml fresh Lime Juice
15ml Don's Mix
15ml Falernum
6 drops of Pernod
1 bar spoon Grenadine
1 dash of Angostura Bitters
Don's Mix is a 2:1 blend of Grapefruit Juice and Cinnamon Syrup.
I actually couldn't get Cinnamon Syrup, so I just put 5 more ml of Falernum in it.
Falernum itself is a lot like Orgeat. It's an almond syrup that also contains clove, vanilla and ginger. It's a Tiki standard.
The actual Zombie, as opposed to most recipes you will find, has basically no fruit juice in it. No passion fruit, no papaya, no orange. Just lime and grapefruit.
Oh and four ounces of rum, one of them overproof.
Puerto Rican rum usually implies "if you can't get Cuban rum". So I'm using 7yr old Havanna Club.
For the Jamaican I'm using 8yr old Appleton Estate.
The overproof choice would usually be Smith&Cross, but mine is empty and the store was fresh out. So I picked Pott 54%, which is basically a Jamaican rum, so not quite as molasses heavy as a Demarara would be.
I have Pernod, but not the Pastis but the Absinthe, so that's what I'm using.
Proper Absinthe is still somewhat regulated in burgerland, whereas we can get the good shit and I've got a good selection of French Absinthes at home. Because of course I do.
It's a shame that they didn't have cinnamon syrup. Usually, they have it where they have coffee for basic bitches. But they only had vanilla and caramel there. I can see that adding another dimension rhat I'm not getting here.
As it stands, what I have is a cocktail that has a lot in common with the Mai Tai. It's a more dry blend of rums. It's noticeable why Demarara was picked originally. I'll try one with dark rum instead next. I don't think it's too bad that it isn't overproof, as we're not wanting for a lack of alcohol content with this cocktail anyway.
But even I am noticing a slight buzz from just one of these. It would certainly kill any hangover you have in an instant. A second one would get you right back to being fucked up, though.
Don't mind me posting a bunch of nonsense later today.