Trip report: Pilikia, Dallas - Tiki Travel

M mikehooker Grand Member (3 years) Austin Joined: Jul 17, 2014 Posts: 1211	M mikehooker Posted posted on Mon, Feb 13, 2017 2:55 PM On 2017-02-13 11:19, Prikli Pear wrote: Since I was driving myself, and had never had a real one, I ordered a single mai tai. The bartender was friendly and chatted as he mixed my drink. It was an impressive display. The drink itself was fine. Was it authentic? As far as I could tell it was, but I had no baseline for comparison. I'd happily drink one again. Not so great was the $11 price tag. Ouch. I expected complex tiki drinks to cost more than your standard issue rum-and-Coke, but still. I guess I need to reset my expectations. Sorry to chime in before you complete your exhaustive review (which I really appreciate and look forward to reading your conclusion!) but welcome to the world of craft cocktails. A Mai Tai made with quality ingredients should cost you $11. At most tiki bars cocktails range anywhere from $10-15. Sometimes daiquiris, weekly specials or happy hour drinks can get you down to the $6-8 range but in my experience bars often make those drinks with inferior ingredients so you might as well splurge on the good stuff. Are you a member of the Texas Tikiphiles facebook group? If not, you should join. A few people went opening week and wrote absolutely scathing reviews of this place. A lot of it had to do with the atmosphere (i.e. red carpet, velvet rope and bouncers at the front door, boom boom music inside, "Reserved" signs all over the place, and less than stellar cocktails and service) so I'm happy to read a more positive take. From my understanding it's a restaurant group that opened this place to cash in on the tiki resurgence and not done by folks actually invested in the culture. I was sad to hear the poor drink reviews but looking at the menu it looks like they had someone with decent knowledge put together their drink program. It might just be apathetic or inexperienced bartenders falling short on the execution that cause the quality of drinks to suffer. To me consistency is the name of the game. Sadly a lot of people trying tiki drinks for the first time with no basis of comparison will still think that poorly made cocktails are great which is sad. Few things in life are better than a properly made Mai Tai. [ Edited by: mikehooker 2017-02-13 14:55 ]

On 2017-02-13 11:19, Prikli Pear wrote:

Since I was driving myself, and had never had a real one, I ordered a single mai tai. The bartender was friendly and chatted as he mixed my drink. It was an impressive display. The drink itself was fine. Was it authentic? As far as I could tell it was, but I had no baseline for comparison. I'd happily drink one again. Not so great was the $11 price tag. Ouch. I expected complex tiki drinks to cost more than your standard issue rum-and-Coke, but still. I guess I need to reset my expectations.

Sorry to chime in before you complete your exhaustive review (which I really appreciate and look forward to reading your conclusion!) but welcome to the world of craft cocktails. A Mai Tai made with quality ingredients should cost you $11. At most tiki bars cocktails range anywhere from $10-15. Sometimes daiquiris, weekly specials or happy hour drinks can get you down to the $6-8 range but in my experience bars often make those drinks with inferior ingredients so you might as well splurge on the good stuff.

Are you a member of the Texas Tikiphiles facebook group? If not, you should join. A few people went opening week and wrote absolutely scathing reviews of this place. A lot of it had to do with the atmosphere (i.e. red carpet, velvet rope and bouncers at the front door, boom boom music inside, "Reserved" signs all over the place, and less than stellar cocktails and service) so I'm happy to read a more positive take.

From my understanding it's a restaurant group that opened this place to cash in on the tiki resurgence and not done by folks actually invested in the culture. I was sad to hear the poor drink reviews but looking at the menu it looks like they had someone with decent knowledge put together their drink program. It might just be apathetic or inexperienced bartenders falling short on the execution that cause the quality of drinks to suffer. To me consistency is the name of the game. Sadly a lot of people trying tiki drinks for the first time with no basis of comparison will still think that poorly made cocktails are great which is sad. Few things in life are better than a properly made Mai Tai.

[ Edited by: mikehooker 2017-02-13 14:55 ]

Post #772925 by mikehooker on Mon, Feb 13, 2017 2:55 PM