International Daiquiri Day celebrates the great Cuban rum cocktail, with leading London bars offering their twists on the classic all week
Launched a few years ago, International Daiquiri Day on 19 July has now, backed by Ron Santiago de Cuba, expanded to Daiquiri Week – 17-23 July. Fingers crossed for a Daiquiri Month next year, and eventually an International Daiquiri Quarter that lasts the whole summer. While we won’t be seeing this annual event coming up automatically on our Google calendars, it is a great opportunity to see what twists London’s bars can come up with on the classic rum, lime and sugar concoction – as many of them (as well as bars in Paris, Berlin, Madrid, Turin and Havana) have signed up to Ron Santiago de Cuba’s Casa del Daiquiri activation.
As with all stalwart cocktails, the origins of the daiquiri are debated. But not fiercely. Ernest Hemingway supposedly described his nightly bar crawl as ‘Mi mojito en La Bodeguita; en El Floridita, mi daiquiri,’ and the Havana bar proclaims itself ‘la cuna [cadle] del daiquiri’. However the drink was known a decade before El Floridita opened – most likely created in 1898 by Jennings Stockton Cox, an American engineer who ran the iron ore mine in Daiquirí near Santiago de Cuba.
What El Floridita’s bartender Constantino Ribalaigua Vert did do was introduce the idea of variations on the simple recipe – he was also the first to blend ice into the cocktail, inventing the frozen daiquiri that many people think of as the original. There was the Papa Doble Daiquiri, with a ratio change supposedly demanded by Hemingway (twice the rum, half the sugar); the Hemingway itself (addition of maraschino and grapefruit juice); and the Daiquiri No.2 El Floridita-style (with red vermouth, crème de cacao and grenadine syrup).
Bartenders and Ron Santiago de Cuba (that’s the rum brand from the south-east end of the island) have taken this spirit of experimentation and run with it for Casa del Daiquiri. The London bars involved include Mr Fox, Hawksmoor Air Street, Trailer Happiness and Nightjar Shoreditch. However, Brummell recommends a West End version of Hemingway’s rum crawl.
Santiago de Cuba 11 Year Old Extra Añejo will be a prominent base spirit on International Daiquiri Day
Start at Alma on Great Marlborough Street for an I’ll Just Have A Rum & Coke – a bit of a protest drink inspired by the frequent response to a list of craft rum cocktails, made from Santiago de Cuba 11 Year Old Extra Añejo, Caleño Dark & Spicy non-alcoholic spirit (which has a hint of cola), clarified guava and lime curd, and a mandarin mist. Then move on to the branch of Nightjar just off Carnaby Street for a Habana Vieja, where the same Extra Añejo rum is mixed with mango purée, a tincture based on a Zara cocktail (smoky whiskey, maraschino, absinthe), with a mango shrub and fresh lime. End the evening at Coya on Piccadilly for the stunning crème fraîche-washed Extra Añejo, with grapefruit and lime oleo saccharum (citrus oils extracted by sugar), topped with a sorrel foam and dusted with hibiscus.
Each venue offers small-plate sharing food too (don’t miss the olives in aji verde at Alma; steak and parmesan tartare with red pesto at Nightjar; and the wagyu bao at Coya). And they all serve the classic daiq’ if you want to keep it old school. Just don’t ask why it’s not frozen!
