Piña Colada
Prep time:
Rum, pineapple and cream of coconut blended until they turn into something close to drinkable ice cream. It dates from 1954, it is the national drink of Puerto Rico, and nearly everything that goes wrong with it comes from mistaking cream of coconut for coconut milk.
Ingredients
- 2 oz of White Rum
- 2 oz of Coconut Cream
- 4 oz of natural pineapple juice
- 1 cup of crushed ice
Preparation
- In a blender, place the white rum, coconut cream, and pineapple juice.
- Add the crushed ice.
- Blend at high speed for about 15 to 20 seconds until you get a smooth, creamy, homogeneous consistency (frappé or "slushie" style).
- Pour the mixture into the glass.
- Decorate the edge with the piece of pineapple and place the cherry on top.
Bartender’s notes
Who invented the Piña Colada?
The best-supported account places it at the Caribe Hilton in San Juan in 1954, with bartender Ramón “Monchito” Marrero, who by the hotel’s telling spent three months adjusting it before he was satisfied. In 2004 the government of Puerto Rico handed the hotel a proclamation marking the drink’s fiftieth anniversary. It is not the only claim: the Barrachina restaurant, also in San Juan, credits Ramón Portas Mingot, though at a later date. The end of the story is not in dispute — since 1978 it has been the national drink of Puerto Rico.
White rum or aged?
White is the canonical choice and what the recipe asks for. But the drink carries so much sweetness — the cream of coconut comes sugared and the pineapple adds its own — that a young white rum vanishes completely: what is left is a coconut shake with alcohol in it. A five or seven year old aged rum changes that. Its vanilla and oak hold up underneath the coconut and give the drink a base it did not have. Some consider it heresy and some never go back. If you want both, the bar trick is to build it with white and float half an ounce of aged rum on top.
Piña Colada twists
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