LCBO Food & Drink Summer 2022

THE DAIQUIRI

the creator, preserved in the collection of the University of Miami library. His name was Jennings Stockton Cox, and he was an American engineer overseeing an ironmine in a coastal Cuban village called Daiquirí. In the summer of 1898, some American VIPs came to visit the mine, and Cox, who was running low on his favourite tipple of imported gin, decided to offer them the local rum—a clean-tasting, elegant white rum from the Bacardi family distillery in nearby Santiago de Cuba—sharpened with citrus and sweetened with sugar. Here is his recipe, verbatim: “For 6 persons—the juice of 6 lemons, 6 teaspoonsful of sugar, 6 Bacardi cups ‘Carta Blanca,’ 2 small cups

of mineral water, plenty crushed ice—Put all ingredients in a cocktail shaker—and shake well—Do not strain as the glass may be served with some ice.” Crystal clear! Except—lemons? Really? All the experts agree he must have meant The original recipe, hand-written by Jennings Stockton Cox, is preserved in the collection of the University of Miami library.

WHICH RUM? It has to be a young, dry white rum or the drink isn’t a Daiquiri.

limones verdes not limones —in other words, limes. And how could he fit all that in a cocktail shaker? It would have to be the size of a bucket. Fortunately, Cox had a colleague at the mine, another American called Harry E. Stout, who took his own notes and later handed them on to his friend the writer Charles H. Baker Jr. Baker duly recorded them in his splendid book The Gentleman’s Companion (1939) as: “11/2 oz Bacardi Carta Blanca rum, 2 tsp sugar, the juice of 11/2 small green limes, strained, and very finely cracked ice. Shake very hard and pour, ice and all, into a tall glass.” That’s more like it! People—including Cox himself, when he was alive— have been tinkering with the Daiquiri ever since it was invented. By the time a young U.S. Navy doctor called Lucius W. Johnson visited the mine in 1909, Cox had whittled the drink down to 11/2 oz rum, 1 tsp sugar and the juice of half a lime, stirred in the glass with finely

Cuba’s Havana Club Original 3 Year Old (LCBO 337667, $30.20) is older, fruitier, with a touch of smoke.

El Dorado 3 Year Old (LCBO 402859, $29.70) , from Guyana, brings subtle notes of toffee and coconut that work beautifully with the lime.

Now made in Puerto Rico, Bacardí Superior (LCBO 117, $29.95) is as smooth and clean as it gets, with the barest hint of vanilla.

shaved ice. Johnson took that recipe back to The Army and Navy Club in Washington, D.C., where it quickly caught on, soon spreading to fashionable New York hotel bars. When F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote about drink ing Daiquiris in his smash-hit first novel, This Side of Paradise (1920), the cocktail seemed set for a glittering career. Until Prohibition brought everything to a stop.

ORIGINAL DAIQUIRI RECIPE COURTESY OF THE CUBAN HERITAGE COLLECTION, UNIVERSITY OF MIAMI LIBRARIES

86 FOOD & DRINK SUMMER 2022