“There are some drinks that are the litmus test of a bar,” says Ray Sakover, co-owner of New York’s Paradise Lost. “The Daiquiri is one of the big ones.” A simple trifecta of ingredients, the Daiquiri is, like so many cocktails we consider classics, a simple drink on paper, but one that becomes a delicate balancing act in the glass. Failure to find that balance is the primary pitfall that plagues the drink. Too much or too little of any given ingredient leads to a drink that’s too sweet, too sour, too flabby, too lean. So what does the ideal Daiquiri look like in 2024?
“I want it to be dry, crisp, lively,” said rum expert Paul McGee, who joined the Punch team and Sakover at Paradise Lost for a recent Daiquiri blind tasting in search of the best expression of the drink. “I want to taste all the components of the cocktail,” said Sakover. “I want to taste the rum; I want it to be bright and refreshing and have good body.”
Today, however, the modern Daiquiri is far from a single, fixed thing. A boom in the number of rums available in the U.S. market since the last time we blind-tasted the drink in 2017 has led to a remarkably expansive palette with which bartenders can paint their perfect Daiquiri. As a result, the Daiquiri feels more malleable than ever, with bartenders able to tap into a seemingly infinite combination of rums to suit any profile they desire. “Not only do bartenders need to balance the rum alongside the lime and sugar; more than ever, they need to balance the rum against the other rums in the blend they create,” observed McGee.
Even bartenders who opt for a one-rum approach can choose from a selection of flavorful white rums that are often themselves a multi-island blend within the bottle. With such a bevy of options, some bars—like Room for Improvement in Portland, Maine, and Otto’s High Dive in Orlando, Florida, and even Paradise Lost—are turning the Daiquiri into a choose-your-own-adventure experience, offering not just a single house version, but a dedicated section of the menu with several options to choose from, “light” to “dark,” “refined” to “funky.”
The Daiquiris sampled in the blind tasting, mixed up by Paradise Lost bartender Brendan Parry, reflected the same myriad points of view seen on menus across the country. Some opted to cut the typical light rum base with agricole-style rum, overproof Jamaican rum, pineapple rum or even cachaça; others took a similar approach to the sweetener, creating syrup blends or even dry sugar blends.
Reflecting the full flavor spectrum of Daiquiris in the wild today, our two favorites from the tasting felt like they satisfied two very different drinkers. The more archetypal of the two was the Daiquiri from Justin Levaughn of Otto’s High Dive in Orlando, Florida. His version is built on two ounces of Probitas rum alongside three-quarters of an ounce of lime juice and half an ounce of lime oleo saccharum, which gave the drink a sharper lime flavor thanks to the oil from the peels, similar to using a regal-shake technique. Sakover described it as “the gold standard for what a Daiquiri should be.”
The judges’ other favorite was the Daiquiri by Josh Ibañez, from Rumba in Seattle. Collectively termed the “rum nerd’s Daiquiri” by the tasters, this version calls on a blend of four rums—Brugal Añejo, Don Q Gold, Ten to One White, Wray & Nephew Overproof—alongside a similarly considered sugar blend (a 2:1 sugar syrup in which the sugar component comprises five parts white sugar to one part Demerara sugar) and three-quarters of an ounce of lime juice. Though it is perhaps not for everyone, the judges praised its pronounced—but not overbearing—rum profile, which had the distinctive ester-y aroma of Jamaican rum as well as the layered complexity that comes with a four-rum blend spanning ages, styles and countries of origin. “The rum is in the forefront,” said Sakover, “but the lime and sugar are still there playing supporting roles.”
Selecting a third left the judges once again divided between two recipes that felt equally classic, albeit targeted at different audiences. One appealed more to fans of a drier, crisper profile, and the other to those seeking a rounder, richer Daiquiri. The former was the Daiquiri of Julio Bermejo from Miami’s Cafe La Trova, whose ultra-classic spec calls on two ounces of Planteray 3 Stars, three-quarters of an ounce of lime juice, and one and a half teaspoons of dry granulated sugar—a traditional choice that cuts back on dilution, allowing the rum to shine. The other was the Daiquiri by Pietro Collina, whose recipe took top honors at our last Daiquiri tasting; it’s similarly textbook, opting for Nicaraguan Flor de Caña 4-year rum as the base and a rich Demerara syrup as the sweetener, giving the drink a touch more body and caramelized flavor that Sakover deemed “crushable.”
Though there may not be just one right way to make a Daiquiri today, there is certainly a wrong way. “A lot of times you get a Daiquiri and it just tastes like limeade,” said McGee. “The rum needs to come through no matter what.”
