“Mai Tais are very tiki in that they’re very onerous to stability,” says Kavé Pourzanjani, proprietor of Paradise Misplaced in New York Metropolis. “All of the tiki [drink] issues apply: They’re usually too candy, and in case your lime juice isn’t recent it fully ruins the cocktail.”

Although the Dealer Vic unique ranks among the many easier tiki recipes on paper, its 4 key elements—rum, lime juice, orgeat and orange liqueur—aren’t a straightforward mixture to get proper. And the methods by which issues can go fallacious have developed through the years. “Ten to twenty years in the past, ‘too candy’ was a priority,” stated Kathryn “Pepper” Stashek of Bar Kabawa, additionally in New York. “I feel now we will skew too dry.” 

Stashek and Pourzanjani have been joined by rum knowledgeable Paul McGee and myself to go looking for the final word Mai Tai. We have been in search of a drink that was vibrant and had a pronounced rum spine, with out an excessive amount of funk. “It is best to style all the weather, however the purpose is that all the pieces comes collectively coherently,” stated McGee.

Naturally, one of many largest variables among the many recipes was the rum selection: No two recipes referred to as for a similar mix. Some even included different sugarcane spirits, like clairin and charanda, into their recipes. Dealer Vic used a 17-year-old Jamaican rum in his unique recipe, so the judges have been in search of one thing that had the richness that comes with age, however have been open to a cut up base as long as it didn’t throw the drink out of stability. “These bolder rums that bartenders favor can backfire in a Mai Tai,” stated McGee.  

However rum was removed from the one consideration. As Stashek famous, “I’ve had good Mai Tais with any variety of totally different rums; there are quite a lot of totally different blends that work. I need to know what orgeat you’re utilizing.” She added: “I don’t need it to be too syrupy, however I need to style almond in there.” As with the rums, no two recipes used the identical orgeat; six have been housemade, together with one which used cashews in lieu of almonds, whereas three have been store-bought. 

The unanimous winner was Garret Richard’s Mai Tai, which additionally took high honors at our final Mai Tai tasting, in 2019. His recipe splits the rum quotient between an oz and a half of Denizen Service provider’s Reserve 8-year rum—a mix designed particularly for the Mai Tai—and three-quarters of an oz of Coruba Darkish Jamaican rum. His orgeat of selection is the store-bought Latitude 29 formulation, whereas the orange liqueur is cut up between Clément Créole Shrubb, a rhum agricole–based mostly liqueur, and Grand Marnier, which is Cognac-based. When this drink got here out, the final in our tasting, Stashek famous, “This hits all 4 notes that I’m in search of, and in the best order.” Pourzanjani declared, “That tastes like a Mai Tai.”

Second place went to the Mai Tai from Josh Schaff at Cayo Coco in Birmingham, Alabama. His recipe builds off of an oz of Appleton Signature rum, complemented with a half-ounce every of Planteray and Myers’s. (The bar makes use of limited-edition variations of every, however Schaff urged the flagships of every model of their place.) Along with the home orgeat (which blends almond milk with sugar, orange flower water and rose water), Demerara syrup and Pierre Ferrand Dry Curaçao spherical out the recipe. The judges discovered it vibrant, with a pleasing candied orange high quality, and never too dry. The rum mix was mellow, prompting McGee to dub it “a Mai Tai for the folks.”

In third was the Mai Tai of Will Pasternak, a New York bartender previously of the rum bar Blacktail. His recipe combines two rums—Appleton Property 12-year and Rhum J.M Blanc—alongside two orange liqueurs, Orgeat Works toasted almond syrup, lime juice, wealthy cane syrup and some dashes of saline resolution. The judges appreciated the inclusion of a bolder agricole-style rum. “It’s a balanced Mai Tai the place you’ll be able to style the rum,” stated Stashek. In different phrases, it ticked all of the containers.