Tag: Zombie

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Final Ohana Night at The Kon-Tiki

The Kon-Tiki is closing after service on Sunday but the place is going out with a bang as patrons from far and wide and coming for one final cheeseburger or cocktail. Wednesday was the last Ohana night, the day of the week when local tikiphiles have come to hang out on what is generally a slower night than the weekends. But this Wednesday was anything but slow, with a persistent full room and a wait out the door.

The Kon-Tiki staff were in full force, with all three service wells going at the same time to pump our drinks in a timely manner. There were several wait staff, several kitchen runners, and nice to see Jeanie Grant back in the house serving as the maître d’. We want to specifically call out Chris Parker and Kriss Cucuy for exceptional service for me personally this evening.

I’m working to complete another homemade “Kon-Tiki cocktail checklist” and knocked out a few cocktails and am ready to close it out on Sunday with Mrs. Mai Tai’s help. It’d been forever since I had the Zombie and found it to be pretty great – both potent and fruity, with a touch of spice. The Virgin’s Sacrifice was far too spicy for my mild tongue so I passed it over to Jeff as a bonus. Lastly, I had the Leviathan for Two (but just for me this evening) which I’d never had before and immediately liked. The cocktail has rum, bourbon, tangerine, and spices and was nice and rich and balanced. I’m going to miss the consistently high quality of cocktails here.

If you’re trying to get to Kon-Tiki in the next couple days, prepare for waits and treat the staff with kindness. It was so fantastic last night to see the crew working so efficiently on such a busy night – all to the sound of Yacht Rock that the Kon-Tiki used to play religiously and was a welcome return for me.

The Leviathan came in a nice Moai Mug that had a little tear-like drip that was all the more poignant as I left Ohana night for the last time.

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Beachbum Berry’s Latitude 29 – Best Tiki Bar in NOLA

We bookended two visits to Beachbum Berry’s Latitude 29 during our visit to New Orleans, making sure to visit more than once to the preeminent restaurant and tiki bar from acclaimed author and cocktail historian Jeff “Beachbum” Berry. Look at the menu of nearly any tiki bar and you’ll find Berry’s original cocktails or more likely cocktails whose recipes were lost until uncovered by Berry. Check out his books Potions of the Caribbean or even better the 10th anniversary edition of Sippin’ Safari for all the historical details written in the Bum’s inimitable style, but suffice to say that every single fan of this genre owes the Bum a huge debt of gratitude.

Inside Latitude 29, there are tables and booths on one side and bar / hi-top seating on the other, and we got to experience both on the trip. There’s a smallish food menu her and while I loved the burger and pimento cheese rangoons, it was tough for Mrs. Mai Tai to find something she liked between the fishy catfish bao and Korean fried chicken. Our service was generally good, though it appeared staff was one server shy of a full crew both times.

Mai Tai and Burger

But nobody comes to Latitude 29 for the food; we come for the immersive tiki bar decor and the amazing cocktails. We’ll talk more about the Mai Tai tomorrow but we’ll say that overall the standard cocktail menu items were really great, including the Navy Grog (the Bum’s favorite), Zombie, and a fab Rum Barrel with a ridiculously over the top garnish. A top-notch Cobra’s Fang was on the special Halloween menu which also featured some other impressive cocktails. You can even get drinks to go, which we took advantage of with a to-go Mai Tai!

Rum Barrel

Latitude 29 was well-decorated for Halloween and it is great to see special decor and the standard stuff mixed in between, complete with a killer spooky soundtrack. There’s a cabinet of historical items in the bar area, plus Beachbum Berry merch if that’s your thing. We loved our visits to this wonderful bar and must-see destination for any NOLA visitor interested in cocktails.

Entrance on Peters Street
Extra Cranberries!
Navy Grog
Mai Tai To Go
with Joe and Maggie
Cobra’s Fang
with Amy
and David
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$1 Applebee’s Zombie

Some of you remember the $1 Mai Tai that Applebee’s issued during Mai Tai month in 2019. That featured black cherry and passionfruit and bunch of other ingredients and in no way resembled a Mai Tai, but had enough rum to be considered reasonable for a dollar.

To celebrate Halloween, Applebee’s is now offering a bright blue Zombie for a dollar. Cocktail fans know that a Zombie should never be blue, but Applebee’s isn’t really craft cocktails anyway so the criteria is a little different. Is it reasonable, especially for the price?

The cocktail is batched and is garnished with a brain gummy, but doesn’t have a predominant flavor besides “sweet”. I don’t expect a traditional Zombie level of booze (“limit two per customer”) but even for a dollar I wasn’t getting much alcohol. Kind of a bust.

My local Applebee’s was hopping and there were a bunch of regulars hooting it up with the bartender who’s been there forever (I remember her from the $1 Mai Tai days). Not that different than Ohana night at your favorite tiki bar, except the decor and drinks are different, and my tall draft Modelo was only five bucks. Not so terrible in the neighborhood, if you want my honest opinion.

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Quality Cocktails are Still a Thing at San Francisco’s Tonga Room

After the San Francisco Giants home opener, we headed to The Tonga Room for a Friday night dinner and drinks. I’m pleased to report that the refreshed cocktail menu from October is still being used and that the quality hasn’t degraded at all. We will note that prices have increased $2-4 per cocktail, putting these firmly as the most expensive in town though. The Mai Tai and Hand Shaken Colada cocktails were big hits with our friends and Mrs. Mai Tai liked the tropical Mimosa-style Tiny Bubbles cocktail.

Tiki Hunter at The Tonga Room

The Tonga Room’s Zombie features five different rums with falernum, grenadine, Don’s Mix, along with a bit of pineapple juice. It most certainly packs a punch, and I found it to be pretty good. I also liked the Wiki Wiki cocktail, a juicy blend of rums, spices, and just the right amount of Allspice Dram. Meanwhile, the Tiki Hunter remains the most interesting and flavor-forward tropical cocktail – don’t let the listed Jäegermeister component scare you off, it’s delicious.

The band plays on the floating stage starting at 7:00 pm, with the players this time featuring two female vocalists. This worked great on a stellar version of Fleetwood Mac’s mellow hit “Dreams.” But we continue to feel that 80s pop songs like “Crazy for You” don’t play as well as those from earlier decades. If pop must be played, the Sixties and Seventies feel more organic and connected to this retro leaning Polynesian palace.

Our dinner and service were as stellar as always. The Asian-inspired dishes are really good here, though I wish there was a little bit more variety on the menu as this is very seafood forward. The prices are fairly high, though not outside what you’d expect from a fine dining restaurant in The City. And you can’t beat the gorgeous interior with the pool and the thunderstorm that comes every 20 minutes. But remember that it’s a $1000 fine for jumping in the pool. Staff told me they’ve already had one person do this so far this year, which seems like way more than one too many.

Wiki Wiki
Mai Tai, Colada, Tiny Bubbles
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Ultimate-ish Zombie

I was really happy with the recipe for the Ultimate Mai Tai, using my Ultimate Mai Tai Rum Blend. And I was super happy with the Ultimate Navy Grog which used that rum in combo. But I’ve never been able to come up with a Zombie recipe that I liked using that rum. But after some experimentation and tinkering I’m pretty happy with how this came out.

Now, don’t get me wrong, this isn’t as good as a 1934. All hail Donn Beach for developing it and to Jeff Berry for rediscovering and decoding the recipe decades later. So, it is only ultimate-ish. But if you’re looking for a little twist on the Zombie I’d suggest giving this a try.

Thanks to Ed Hamilton and the aforementioned Jeff Berry for developing a Zombie rum to give this the necessary flavor profile and kick.

Ultimate-ish Zombie
1 oz Ruby Grapefruit Juice (strained)
½ oz Lime Juice
½ oz Passionfruit Syrup
¼ oz Molasses Syrup
½ oz Velvet Falernum
⅛ oz Cinnamon Syrup
1 oz Hamilton Beachbum Berry Zombie Blend
1 oz Ultimate Mai Tai Blend
4 drop Pernod
4 dash Angostura Bitters
Shake with crushed ice
Garnish with mint

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Tipsy Terrier Halloween Party

Thanks to Amy and Kirk for throwing another amazing backyard Halloween Party last night in San Jose. Their large home tiki bar, the Tipsy Terrier, is the centerpiece and fantastic but we most spent time in the yard and patio enjoying the myriad Halloween decorations.

They served a wide assortment of boozy beverages including fantastic versions of the 1944 Mai Tai, Three Dots and a Dash, and great blood red Zombie. Super flavorful and definitely not watered down for a general audience. There were also Aperol Spritz’s and Champagne Cocktails. So nice when the host give you the fixing and you can prepare it to suit. Beer on tap and Sangria from a fountain were available for those with less ambitious prep desires, or just because they prefer it.

Mrs. Mai Tai came up with the idea for our costume – Jack and Wendy from The Shining. All works and no play makes Jack a dull boy.

Some truly outstanding costumes at the party, and nice to see some familiar faces but also to meet some new people too.

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Zombie Grapefruit Shootout

My last cocktail comparison between White Grapefruit juice and Rudy Red juice is a Zombie. For the comparison I decided to use the recipe on the bottle of the Beachbum Berry Zombie Blend from Hamilton Rum since this uses a bit more grapefruit juice than the original 1934 recipe (and significantly less rum, useful since I wasn’t going to drink two full Zombies). The Zombie Blend is pretty great and this does make a very good Zombie.

Unfortunately, from a grapefruit juice comparison the two Zombies tasted nearly identical. I was getting slightly more cinnamon notes from the Ruby version, which might be due to the juice being sweeter and with a lighter body. Or I could simply have measured an ever so slightly different half ounce in the cocktail. I’m pretty sensitive to the cinnamon flavor, and in fact went a little light on the measurement. I compensated by adding an equivalently higher amount of Falernum.

To conclude the Grapefruit Juice Shootout Comparisons:

Thanks to @vonschiltach for the white grapefruits for testing.