Favorite 5 Gallon Recipes

I'm having a birthday party over Memorial Day weekend and I'm looking to fill a couple of 5 gallon drink coolers with yummy, crowd pleasing, knock you down, tiki drink.

What would be good to make that wont empty my pockets?

I've had good luck mixing huge batches of the Rum Barrel from the original Grog Log. The only thing I change is cutting the 151 in half and adding gold rum (Appleton or Mount Gay.) It's a real crowd pleaser, sweet enough to please the Tiki Newbies and sweet-tooths yet complex and strong enough for more sophisticated Tikiphiles. Be sure to warn your guests that the magic nudity number is 4 Rum Barrels--no one hits four and still has all their clothes on.

The Mai Kai Barrel O Rum is another good bet. You can find that recipe online or in Beachbum Barry's newest recipe book, Taboo Table

Another drink I would recommend that's real easy to make in big batches is the following Blue Hawaii recipe, posted by my friend I, Zombie some time ago:

1 part Malibu
1 part Bols Blue Curacao
3 parts Dole Pineapple juice

Throw a handful or two of ice in a blender and fill with this mixture. Blend until smooth. If too sweet for your friends, add a little lime juice. Serve in a clear glass so people can get all excited about the color.

Hmmm. 5 gallons is 80 8 ounce drinks. So, pick any good recipe and multiply the ingredients times 80!

Mai Tai:

4 liters of rum
1 liter of Orgeat
1 liter of Curacao
1/2 liter of sugar syrup
1 liter of lime juice or so.
Lots of ice.

This is actually about 33 times the recipe. Hmmm. Looks like about 2.5 gallons of liquid there. Maybe half again these amounts.

That's what I mean about emptying my pockets. Of course the first thing I thought of was to mix a 5 gallon mai tai, but that's like a $200 punch!

a COUPLE of 5 gallon containers? that's a LOT of rum punch, man! Seriously, how many people are coming? We had about 50 people to Mr. Pineapple's 40th, and we (well, Martiki & Rebecca) made Painkiller punch and another punch, (I think he did Trader Vic's or Coronado Luau, but I'm not sure, he 'diluted' it with champagne??)

Martiki - what punch do you make with the champagne??

I think all together, we spent less than $150 on booze, umbrellas, etc. The punch recipes in the Grog Log are powerful, and are meant to sit with some ice melting in them, so 2.5 gallons of Mai Tais, with 2.5 gallons of ice, tadaa! 5 gallon Mai Tai.

Here is an excellent tip we learned pre-birthday party: the morning of the party go to the fish/meat counter at the big grocery store, take an empty cooler, and ask the meat manager to fill it from their ice crusher. Once they've laid the meat out, the ice machine refills itself, and they don't need more till the next day. The ice is clean and crushed to perfection, and if you send your wife, girlfriend or sister :wink: ask super nice, explain the festive occasion, and offer to pay for it, they will most likely give you cooler full of crushed ice for FREE! This is for the drink cups, and freeze a big giant block for the 5 gallon containers, they'll melt slow, and the crushed ice in the cup will dilute the punch! Have a lovely Birthday!

I've found the 'Chief Lapu Lapu' from the Grog Log to be the ideal "5 gallon" drink. It's good n' tasty, and the recipe converts easily. I always have a self-serve batch in a Sparkletts bottle/dispenser at my parties. Set a cooler of ice, a stack of cups and a bottle of 151 next to the dispenser and - voila! Instant bartender!

Lapus do multiply really well.

We added Champagne to a giant Scorpion bowl, if I remember right. That's a Scorpion, Trad'r Sam's Style.

Thanks everyone! We're actually doing one cooler with alcohol and one alcohol-free for the kiddies (I'll make sure and label them clearly!), then a chest full of beer. I have lots of punch recipes, but I wanted to do something that was more like a cocktail that wouldn't cost me a ton to make.

I'm also firing up the grill, so I need some good recipes for that. Again, I have tons of recipes for stuff, I just wanted to try something different.

Mahalo!

Hey Finkdaddy,
All ya need on the grill are Sabu's Chicken Skewers... oh man they're good.
I also do pulled pork bbq for big parties. It goes great with Mai Tai's or anything for that matter.
Aloha,
:tiki:

I have been asked to make Mai Tai's for a friend's party and I want to make a large quantity all at once, then just float the dark rum (and add the mint sprig, of course) as I give them out. Most of the people at the party are familliar with the type of Mai Tai's you might find at a regular (non-Tiki bar) restaurant. In my experience, some have found the "Original" to be too sweet or tart.

My question is:
Do I go with the Orgeat Syrup & Orange Curacao mixture or the Sweet & Sour with Triple Sec mixture? Which do you think is the better crowd pleaser?

Mahaloz in advance for your help!!

I've never been able to make a successful big batch o'Mai tai's. As in cooking, you can't just multiply everything by 25 and hope it turns out. You need to adjust certain portions. Also, ice is a big part of the mai tai... the shaking introduces a fair amount of water to the mix... so you'd need to do the same in bulk somehow.

The best drink-in-bulk I've been able to make is (no suprize) the Zombie. I actually bought one of those Jose Cuervo plastic party balls (don't worry, they come empty) with the built in pump ($6.99 last time I saw them) and spend a 1/2 hour pouring in everything to about 75% full, then use the remaining 25% to add what it needs to taste. the ball can then fit nicely in a box surrounded by ice. Best part is, you get half-crocked by tasting and re-tasting :)

I know this doesn't answer your question, but I thought I'd throw in my 2 Z's

-Z

Thank God The Tiki Bar Is Open
Thank God The Tiki Torch Still Shines...

[ Edited by: Feelin' Zombified on 2005-05-24 09:58 ]

My birthday party is this weekend and I've decided on a couple of recipes.

In a punch bowl I'm just going to make up something. I'm going to mix some pineapple juice with some blue curacao, Cruzan Mango rum, Cruzan Black Strap, and maybe some UV Blue. I'll add some lime if it tastes too sweet. I need a name for this if anybody wants to help out.

In my 5 gallon cooler I'm going to use a mai tai recipe that TikiWahine posted that uses limeaide as a main ingredient. (thanks TikiWahine!)

I figure by the time guests arrive I should be good and tanked just from trying to make these taste good. :D

Mahaloz for your input FZ & FD!

I decided to go with:
Light Rum
Medium Rum
Dark Rum
Sweet & Sour
Triple Sec
Orange Curacao (small amount)
Unsweetened Pineapple Juice

Rather generic, but I think it will be well accepted with this crowd.

I like your idea FZ of the party ball and only filling it 75% to use the rest for modification. You also had a great point about the ice being a part of the finished favoring. Maybe what I'll do is shake the mixture before puring it over ice and adding the dark rum.

I would love to make these individually, but I don't want to get stuck behind the bar all night... wait... yes I do. Nevermind. :wink:

I'll let you know on Monday how it worked out.

Any further input gladly accepted.

Last summer we had a party/ luau in our Tiki Lounge and back yard. We had a LOT of friends and Tiki fanatics over and wanted to provide a decent drink without standing behind the bar all night. Our answer was the 5 gallon Mai-Tai. Granted, we took some liberties with the recipe, (and probably made it a little strong too) but we had no complaints– just compliments.

Besides taste-testing, one of my favorite things was filling the yellow and red cooler from Ace Hardware (like they have on the back of a road-crew truck or on the sidelines of a football game) with tropical concoction. I'm sure your party will be a success with Tiki libations at the ready. Good luck!

Aloha,
-Duke

Thanks Duke,

I'm sure after taste-testing all afternoon, I'll be too drunk to know how the final version came out (or even care). I could recruit tasters, but I'm a hands-on kinda guy. :wink:

sounds like you guys will be having a fantastic weekend!

Glad I could help finkdaddy!

-Tw

If you can find a giant glass barrel, do this...

We filled this with the Zombie concoction from the 1946 first edition of Trader Vics Book of Food & Drink. The book says this serves 60 people. I think about 20 of us drank this in one night. Of course one of the 20 was Pablus, my personal hero.

2 - 750 ml bottles of Meyers (dark) Jamacian rum

4 - 750 ml bottles - Puerto Rican (silver) rum. Baccardi is Puerto Rican, but I like Matusalem Platino.

1 - 750 ml bottle of Demerara 151-proof rum

2 - 750 ml bottles orange curacao

3 quarts lemon juice (Pablus wants it fresh squeezed so we need alot of lemons)

3 quarts orange juice (yep, fresh squeezed as well.)

1 quart grenadine syrup (a bottle of Trader Vics would be great)

2 ounces Herbsaint or Pernod (We've got the Pernod)

KG

The Mai Tai's ended up being a hit and I learned a few things along the way.

My final recipe was (more or less):
1.75 ltr Bacardi Silver Rum
1 ltr Dr. Swami Sweet 'N Sour Mix
2 large bottles of Unsweetened Pineapple Juice
Fresh Juice of 10 limes
Long pour (5 seconds) of Triple Sec
Short pour (3 seconds) of Orange Curacao & TV Orgeat Syrup
Floated 1 oz. Myer's Rum per glass

Once I had the Silver Rum, Sweet & Sour, Pineapple & Lime juice poured into the 2 gallon container, I added the Triple Sec, Orgeat Syrup and Orange Curacao. Mixed all that together, then dispensed a small amount into a shaker with ice. Added a splash of Dark rum and shook it up to taste it. Tried that, then added little pours of Orgeat Syrup & Orange Curacao until the blend was right. The color came out perfect as well.

This version HAD to be shaken with ice for about 10 seconds before adding the Myer's. A few people tried dispensing the mix straight into an ice-filled glass, then floated the Myer's. The result was a high-octane taste that only mellowed when the ice melted.

If I had to do it again, I might add some fresh Orange Juice and I would have added more ice to the container. The reason I didn't add more ice this time was I wasn't sure how long these were going to sit. As it turned out, we stored quite a bit, so the ice would have deluted the mix too much.

This is by-no-means an exact science, but hopefully a good starting point for those of you who might want to try this recipe.

Have fun tasting along the way

[ Edited by: MachTiki on 2005-05-31 14:21 ]