The Search for the Ultimate Mai Tai
Traveling the Bay Area and beyond to find the best Mai Tai in the world! Tiki, cocktails, and adventures by Kevin Crossman
There are still tickets available for Inuhele: Atlanta’s tiki weekend, January 23-25.
This will be our first trip to Inuhele and I’ll be presenting two Mai Tai seminars, updated and refreshed for 2026! We’re excited to present to a Southeast audience, and having a Trader Vic’s in town is a huge plus.
Are you attending Inuhele? Leave a note and let’s be sure to meet up.
If you’re local, leave any touring tips in the comments.
The Miracle Christmas cocktail pop-up franchise has been active for more than a decade and seems to expand locations each year. Founded by Greg Boehm, there are Miracle locations across the globe and a companion pop-up focusing on tiki drinks also running under the Sippin’ Santa brand. The cocktail offerings at Miracle are a little more varied and tend to work better across the different venues hosting the pop-up.
Sunday afternoon we went to Brewster’s in Petaluma, a large beer garden style venue. I went with an old favorite, “Yippee Ki Yay Mother F****r!”, the cocktail with several rums with ube and coconut orgeat. This isn’t too sweet, thanks to acid-adjusted pineapple juice. Brewster’s does pretty good with this, and their super friendly staff really go out of their way to make things jolly. I sampled some of other cocktails at our table and found them to be well prepared.
We ventured to San Jose later that night to check out Miracle at MiniBoss, an arcade themed bar. Mrs. Mai Tai had been to the sister bar Paper Plane earlier in the week and we thought we’d give MiniBoss a try. The drinks here were really good, including the Miracle Mouse that comes in a cute mug and features bourbon, vermouth, strawberry, citrus, and pamplemousse liqueur that likely inspired the name of the cocktail. This wasn’t too sweet and I thought it was delightful. Slightly less good was the Snowball Old Fashioned that our son ordered, just not quite sweet enough, though Mrs. Mai Tai’s Koala LaLaLa was a very refreshing highball with tequila. Cheery Cherry Chocosaurus is more of a desert cocktail but if that’s your thing you’ll love it.
On Festivus Tuesday we battled the rain to check out Pacific Cocktail Heaven in San Francisco. This place is so popular they even charge a $10 cover just to enter. But the skills of the bartenders are evident that the Yippe Ki Yay and Koala cocktails were even better than the other places we tried. Candy Cane Lane is served in a unicorn mug and was a little less sweet than at Brewster’s. PCH was even able to make a pretty reasonable off-menu Mai Tai with Kō Hana rum at my request.
Each of these Miracle locations sets the prices for the cocktails and the mugs/glassware for sale. While the cocktail prices only vary a little, we were shocked to see the mugs at PCH going for $40 which is double what Brewster’s and MiniBoss were charging. It’s a Festivus Miracle!
Miracle hours and dates vary by location but usually run up to New Year’s or a little bit past.
I was remiss in posting a trip report to Pusser’s American Bar, often recognized as one of the best in the world. We missed this last summer and several trusted advisors said it was great, so we made sure to check it out on our recent trip.
We loved the cozy experience, though could only stay for one drink since we’d already had several at nearby Trader Vic’s. The venue has multiple levels and we were seated downstairs, with prompt and immediate service from our server.
The menu is as large as any I’ve ever seen, offering myriad options for whatever type of cocktail you’d like and a large spirits selection as well. Mrs. Mai Tai ordered a Grasshopper that was excellent while I spotted a Mai Tai that listed the ingredients as rum, lime, lemon, sugar, almond. The rum-forward drink was absolutely delicious and a stellar example of what a great Mai Tai should taste like.
The Search for the Ultimate Mai Tai was relaunched on Instagram in December 2017, reviving the brand started way back in 1998. 2700 posts in total and 247 in the last year, chronicling experiences with cocktails, connections with people in the community, and world’s leading feed of Mai Tai minutiae.
We had some great adventures in the last 12 months. A few are chronicled in the photos including some travels with Mrs Mai Tai to far off places such as Palm Springs, Los Angeles, and San Diego. We visited SeaTac for a long weekend and even experienced a tiki bar blackout! We had memorable trips to SoCal including New Year’s Eve at Lucky Tiki and attending the Rum Curious Summit in Long Beach. Locally, I spoke at SF Rum Fest, spoke and toasted at Trader Vic’s Mai Tai Day, and I hosted Mai Tai Trivia in at Dr. Funk in San Jose. I was featured on episodes of the Make & Drink channel on YouTube, including a blind tasting of Appleton Rum Mai Tais, as well as the Tiki Talk Show podcast.
I visited 46 different tiki bars in the last year, plus several home bars including bartending a Circus Peanut party in Marin County. We returned to Europe, including Trader Vic’s in Munich, Matiki in Vienna, and Mata Hari in Zurich. The Ultimate Mai Tai remains on the menu at Tiki Tom’s, but we had to say goodbye to our beloved Kon-Tiki Oakland. Thank you to so many folks in the industry who’ve shown what true hospitality is.
So, thanks to so many fellow Mai Tai fans I’ve had the pleasure of interacting with over the last year. I appreciate your follows, likes, and comments online and in real-life, where UMT stickers are usually enthusiastically received. Here’s to another year.
Cheers!
This Vic’s location has a bad rep amongst some people for drinks that are overpriced and lacking quality, but during two visits we found the cocktails at Trader Vic’s Munich to be just as good as the stateside Vic’s we frequent and pricing to be comparable to other cocktail bars in Europe. One visit was in the bar where the bartender stoically and efficiently kept up with orders.
So, we have very positive things to say. But unfortunately we lead with some disappointment.
The Mai Tai here leans heavily on aged Saint James Rhum Agricole and needs a richer pairing than the Pampero Gold that’s also included, resulting in a cocktail that’s too grassy for my liking. I asked if they had any Jamaican rum and Myers’s was the only one they had, but it would have helped as I feel Myers’s or even a Demerara rum like Pusser’s would be way better than Pampero to balance the Rhum Agricole. I did spot a bottle of Appleton 21 but the pour cost for a Mai Tai would have been €80, so I dropped that idea. Not a bad Mai Tai overall but ought to be better at this venue.
The Menehune Juice was the star of our visits, and not just because the Menehune come home with you. The floral flavors have a pleasant but mild rum flavor and this sips so well that Mrs. Mai Tai ordered this on our second visit and I was tempted to as well.
Munich Sour is the signature cocktail for this location, a variant of the Eastern Sour family of drinks. This one uses local German Brandy that adds richness to the mouthfeel, but the best part was the zingy citrus notes that were just a touch sweet. Too often, Vic’s recipes with lemon and orange lean way too tart, but the Munich Sour was anything but. This was probably the best Vic’s Sour I’ve had at any bar anywhere.
The Samoan Fog Cutter compared very well to the ones I’ve had stateside, and also balanced the lemon quite well. The sherry float is my favorite part, which means this cocktail finishes better than it starts, and the signature mug is always a treat. Finally, I tried Vic’s Itch, a good riff on the Tropical Itch that features bourbon and passionfruit.
Mrs. Mai Tai went with the Banana Dreams and Sea Dreams during our visits. Both lean sweet as constructed, though neither was too much so, and both drinks were comparable to the versions we’ve had before. The Sea Dreams wasn’t in the Seyhorse mug as pictured on the menu, our biggest complaint.
Overall, we had way more hits than misses in Munich and included a couple cocktails that were among the best we’ve had at any Trader Vic’s location.
We’re on a trip across European Christmas Markets, but we made sure to find a special place to celebrate Thanksgiving by making a reservation at the Trader Vic’s in Munich. Restaurant manager Heike reminded us that this is the oldest surviving location in the franchise, and Vic’s was quite busy but we still enjoyed responsive and helpful service and a delicious meal.
The food prices here are a little higher than the locations in the States, but we felt the quality was very high. The Crab Rangoon and Bao Buns were great options from the Pupu menu, and the Wonton Soup was also very good. Our main dish was Walnut Chicken that paired well with some fried rice and white rice, with lots of walnuts and a savory sauce.
As we noted in our visit last year, this Vic’s location is a true time-capsule back to the 1970s thanks to a basement location and elaborate Polynesian decor. There are so many little rooms and we even spotted a private space near the staircase entrance. If peacock chairs are you thing, this Vic’s will be your favorite as it seemed like every table featured at least one. The Hawaiian leaning soundtrack set the mood quite well.
We’ll discuss cocktails in upcoming posts, but are thankful that this amazing Trader Vic’s location is still going strong.
After a red-eye flight and connection through Frankfort, we finally arrived in Vienna where our tour of Christmas Markets starts on Monday. We explored the city a bit and landed back at our Imperial Riding School hotel for a nightcap before crashing.
For my first proper cocktail in Europe I had to go with a classic Daiquiri made with Havana Club 3 and it didn’t disappoint, crisp and limey. It was a really great drink and the Cuban rum never disappoints in this format, though being placed in a Martini glass rather than a coupe meant that I spilled it not once but twice. I hate Martini glasses! Though, in this case, sleep depravation may have played a part.
Mrs. Mai Tai went in a festive direction with a gingerbread Old Fashioned that was delightful, with some really great ice too. I wish my Daiquiri was served in that format.
