Yes, it’s a Mai Tai. It has lime, rum, orange liqueur, and orgeat – just like a Mai Tai should. But we are substituting a high quality Blue Curacao in place of the Orange Curacao and using flavorful clear rum, letting that sweet blue color shine. Giffard is our strongly preferred brand of choice and the best Blue Curacao by a mile.
Any quality aged white rum would do fine here. I’m using Denizen Aged White rum but Probitas, Hamilton White Stache or Breezeway Blend, or even Planteray 3 Star would be fine. You just want to have a little age on the rum to impart some barrel notes that nod to the Mai Tai’s original long-aged rum. Any Overproof Jamaica rum such as Wray & Nephew, Rum Bar, Worthy Park, or Monymusk would fit the bill here though in this case I’m using Rum Fire.
Blue Mai Tai
1 oz Lime Juice
½ oz Orgeat (Latitude 29)
¼ oz Simple Syrup
½ oz Giffard Curaçao Bleu
½ oz Denizen Aged White Rum
1 oz Rum Fire Overproof Jamaica Rum
Shake with crushed ice and garnish with mint.
The clearer and less brown/cloudy your orgeat is the better. Latitude 29 fits the bill perfectly and could be used at ¾ oz to omit the simple syrup entirely.