Anyone Have A Real Pina Colada Recipe?

I'm looking for a Pina Colada recipe that uses real coconut milk instead of Coco Lopez or what ever. I figured I would use the coconut milk and a bit of sugar syrup. Does that sound correct?

Mahalo.

As it turns out a "real" Pina Colada is made with Coco Lopez creme of coconut. When you look into the history of the Pina Colada you'll find that it was first created using Coco Lopez coconut creme. The Pina Colada would not be a Pina Colada without it.

However considering that the Coco Lopez stuff of today is concocted differently than it was originally, (preservatives, etc.) a recipe for a Pina Colada using all natural off the shelf items is not without merit.

I'd like to see some alternative recipes too.

Ok, here's what happened. I had never had a real coconut before, so I was dissapointed with the amount of liquid inside. Gilligan's Island led me to believe I could pour out glassfulls of the stuff. So I poured out what I could into the blender with some chunks of coconut that I cut out with a knife, a few chunks of pineapple, some pineapple juice, a splash of milk ('cause I have no cream), an oz or so of simple syrup, a dolop of Bacardi, and just a touch of Cruzan Mango. I blended it all up and poured it into a shaker with crushed ice, shook until my arm hurt, and poured it into my cocktail glass.

It tasted very good, but nothing like a Pina Colada. Next time I will stick to the Coco Lopez.

When you get the recipe down I hope you will post it. I am still using the traditional receipe, but adding more condiments. I really think they make the drink taste better.

Let's see... We're trying to avoid using Lopez coconut creme but we're using Mango Flavored Rum? Okay.

On 2005-06-18 00:42, Traitor Vic wrote:
Let's see... We're trying to avoid using Lopez coconut creme but we're using Mango Flavored Rum? Okay.

I know that sounds strange. I guess I didn't post all the steps that got me to that point. I wasn't trying to avoid using the Coco Lopez, because I love the stuff, I just wanted to try using real coconut. I didn't originaly use the Mango rum, but after a couple of tries I realized that I wasn't going to get anything close to a good tasting Pina Colada. So I started adding other things to just get a good tasting drink. What I posted was just where I was when I stopped experimenting and using up coconuts. I can't believe how expensive a coconut is in Milwaukee!!

Here's a recipe from The Cocktail Book by Michael Walker (1980):
2 measures white rum
2 measures pineapple juice or 1/2 cup diced pineapple
2 tsp. coconut milk or meat
2 dashes Angostura bitters
1 pinch salt
Place all ingredients in a blender with 4-5 ice cubes and blend until smooth.

Dang! That's a really interesting recipe (and one I will try soon)! At the same time... When we're talking Piña Coladas we're not really talking a Tiki drink. Trader Vic added it to his menu only by refering to it as a Bahia (in order to avoid the Spanish name).

I've seen hundreds of recipes for Pina Coladas and have only rarely seen ones that didn't call for Cream of Coconut. I think that's one thing that the actual cocktail simply calls for. Would it be possible to make a Big Mac without Chemicals? Keep in mind that the name tranlates, loosely, as "strained pineapple".

One could, of course, decide to create a "more sensitive" cocktail (meaning they would pay more attention to what the customer demanded than they would what the customer needed). Just make sure you don't test this recipe on any women, children or bunnies.

1/2 Cup Finely Chopped Pineapple
2 1/2 ounces Malibu
1/4 cup Thai Coconut Milk
1 Tbsp. Fresh Lime Juice
1 Tbsp. Sugar
A thin wedge of pineapple and a slice of lime as garnish

Muoosh it all up in a blender with 6 ice cubes.

On 2005-06-25 02:45, Traitor Vic wrote:
Trader Vic added it to his menu only by refering to it as a Bahia (in order to avoid the Spanish name).

That kind of cracks me up. How did Vic figure that Portuguese was so much more "Trader Vic's" as opposed to Español? Must've been when the Chachacha was OUT and the samba was IN.

BTW, Samba is always IN. :)

Excellent point, Kono! Trader Vic was always what my father likes to call "shifty." Shifty means "Sneaky" on some secondary level, perhaps, but "Good Sneaky Businessman", primarily. Never does it mean "Completely Dishonest" or "Liar." Trader Vic was more than happy to tell you that the Suffering Bastard was a cocktail created in the lounge at Shepheard's Hotel in Cairo in 1950 while handing you a slightly modified Mai Tai with a Cucumber stuck in it. I always just figured Vic didn't want to serve anything that sounded as "Spanish" as Piña Colada. It could be (since he did serve a Daiquiri or two) that he just didn't want to serve a drink that he couldn't claim as his own.
This makes me wonder, too, which came first... The Piña Colada or the Chi Chi? I always assumed that Don the Beachcomber (or someone like him) made a Piña Colada with Vodka and gave it a new name. I've recently read, though, that the Piña Colada was created in the 70s. Of course, the person who wrote what I read might be an idiot. I say we should just try it with Tequila and wake up the next morning and talk about whether it was any good or not (if we decide it wasn't we should decide to try it with better Tequila).

I just got that Trader Vic's Party book from Amazon yesterday. The drink recipes were compiled by TV Vice President Sven Koch and it says, regarding the Bahia, that Vic didn't care for frozen drinks and the Bahia was a Pina Colada mixed in a cocktail shaker rather than a blended frozen drink. So there you go...

According to Dale Degroff, author of The Craft of the Cocktail, the Pina Colada was invented in 1957 by Ramon Marrero, a bartender at Puerto Rico's Caribe Hilton. He then claims that Trader Vic borrowed the recipe in his later cocktail books and called it the Bahia.

Here is a take on the Pina Colada that I call the Semi Colada, I had just made my wife a Tsunami tonight, but I was in the mood for something a little different. It was a little to cool tonight to make a "Frozen" drink (the fog was rolling in off of SF Bay so it was about 50 degrees) so I came up with this.

2oz Coconut Rum
1oz Falernum
2 oz Pineapple juice
1 dash of vanilla extract

add ingredients into an ice filled coctail shaker and shake..
strain into a tall glass filled with crushed ice. I use a pilsner glass or a collins glass. Garnish with a pinapple wedge and a
cherry. the little umbrella is optional.

If you try one let me know how you liked it.

Very good info, Kono and smittylover! Both of those books are on my "GET THESE BOOKS" list but time and money, well... You know. Always great to have friends who share!

I'm not usually much of a Piña Colada drinker myself, but after paying attention to this thread, this 4th of July might have to end up being all Pinapple-Coconutty Flavored!

On 2005-06-22 20:12, smittylover wrote:
Here's a recipe from The Cocktail Book by Michael Walker (1980):
2 measures white rum
2 measures pineapple juice or 1/2 cup diced pineapple
2 tsp. coconut milk or meat
2 dashes Angostura bitters
1 pinch salt
Place all ingredients in a blender with 4-5 ice cubes and blend until smooth.

Hey, thank you for posting the recipe for the drink I am having at this vey moment! Got some leftover Coco Lopez left, after having Mr. and Mrs. Kick_the_Reverb around and following the Mr. advice, I looked for a Pina Colada recipe. Even though Finkdaddy looked for a Lopez-free recipe, this obe tastes good with CL ^__^

The best Pina Colada I've ever had in my life was from a little hut near Akumal in the Yucatan. We found this semi-private beach that we snuck onto and at the end of it was a palapa-roofed snack shack where all the Mayan construction workers would eat at (they were building new beachside mansions for wealthy Europeans). You could get a massive plate of rice and black beans for $1 American. But you could also get a handmade pina colada.

I don't know the proportions, but the Mayan bartender used a machete to hack into a coconut and then poured the milk into a blender and hacked in some of the meat. Then she hacked up a fresh pineapple in there and added some canned pineapple juice. Lots of ice and a squeeze of lime. And of course, a crapload of rum. Garnished with a wedge of fresh pineapple. It think it was $2.50 USD.

We laid on that beach and drank those ALL DAY...with our toes in the powdery white sand and our eyes on that aqua blue water. Yummmm....

[ Edited by: spycygrl 2005-08-15 02:38 ]

[ Edited by: spycygrl 2005-08-15 02:39 ]

Hello Everyone,

I am currently doing research on the Pina Colada, and was hoping you guys/ gals could help me out.

The quote below is the starting point of my investigation:

April 16th 1950, New York Times, "At the Bar":"Drinks in the West Indies range from Martinique's famous rum punch to Cuba's pina colada (rum, pineapple and coconut milk). Key west has a variety of lime swizzles and punches, and Granadians use nutmeg in their rum drinks. Cubans and Puerto Ricans make a variety of tasty and exotic fruit beverages. These include guanabana (soursop juice), fruta bomba (papaya), watermelon juice, muskmelon juice and a drink of almond blended with banana juice."

I have also been sent some other Pre-1950s quotes/ citations for the Pina Colada, available here: http://wiki.webtender.com/wiki/Pina_Colada_Quotes

Can anyone give me the recipe for Trader Vics Bahia and any sources, with years and book references please.

If anyone has any old references to the Pina Colada can they share them please?

Thanks for any help!

Cheers!

George Sinclair

This is one area of tiki mixology where it looks like Trader Vic was a follower and not a leader.

I looked in my 1947 "Bartenders Guide... by Trader Vic", and there is no Bahia or Pina Colada.

In the revised edition of that book "Trader Vic's Bartender's Guide" which came out in 1972 both drinks are listed.

Bahia
2.5 oz unsweetened pineapple juice
1 oz Lopez coconut cream
1 oz white Jamaica rum
1 oz Trader Vic light Puerto Rican rum

Mix with ice cubes in a commercial electric drink mixer (or by hand with a shaker can and mixing glass), Pour into 10-ounce pilsner glass. Fill with cracked ice. Decorate with fresh mint and fruit stick.

Pina Colada
2 oz golden Puerto Rican rum
3 oz unsweetened pineapple juice
Blend in electric drink mixer with 1 scoop of shaved ice for 10 to 20 seconds. Pour over ice cubes in a tall 10-ounce glass. Serve with a straw.
Variation: Add 1 slice of pineapple.

On 2006-04-06 08:25, thinkingbartender wrote:
Hello Everyone,

I am currently doing research on the Pina Colada, and was hoping you guys/ gals could help me out.

Find a copy of this book:
"Mixologist - The Journal of the American Cocktail" published 2005
http://www.mixellany.com/Volume%201.html

I know , I know... The Pina Colada isn't usually thought of as an American cocktail, however, it was 'born' in Puerto Rico which is a US Commonwealth.

This book has a 23 page detailed article on the history of the Pina Colada (with footnotes even).

Here's a teaser article:
http://slammedmagazine.com/inthisissue/05mayjune/pinacoladas.html

I already known of the existence of the "Journal of the American Cocktail" article by Jared Brown, and of course the Slammed Magazine Article. Both are, in my mind, starting from the conclusion that the Peurto Ricans invented the Pina Colada, and then seeking to justify that conclusion.

If you check all the quotes, on the link I provided, you will see that there is more than a little evidence for concluding that the Pina Colada was around along time before the Peurto Rican Claim.

Thanks for the Bahia recipe.

Cheers!

George

More dates from the library

Trader Vics Book of Food and Drink (1946), No mention of either drink
Bartenders Guide by Trader Vic (1947), No mention of either drink
Trader Vics bartenders guide (1972), Bahia and Pina Colada
Rum Cookery and Drinkery (1974), Bahia and Pina Colada
Trader Vics Tiki Party (2005), Bahia only.

P.S. In 1975 Warren Zevon writes Werewolves of London "I saw a werewolf drinking a Pina Colada at Trader Vics and his hair was perfect."

Thanks captnkirk.

From what I have been able to gather the Pina Colada seems to have started life as a non-alcoholic drink, which was either served "colada" (strained) or "sin colar" (without straining). The Pina Colada was also alternatively known as a Pina Fria.

IN CUBA AND JAMAICA by H. G. de Lisser Gleaner Company, Kingston 1910

Pg. 10:

"You ask for "pina fria," and he takes a pineapple and peels it and cuts it into large chunks and pounds it up with white sugar and ice and water, and hands the concoction to you in a huge, thick tumbler, and you find it delicious."

From NEW YORK HERALD-TRIBUNE, 22 March 1952, pg. 9, col. 7:

"Pina Fria has music in its name; two fingers of cold fresh pineapple juice are blended with one and one-half ounces of white Puerto Rican rum and a half teaspoon of sugar. Shake with fine ice; strain into a champagne glass."

From December 1922 issue of TRAVEL magazine:

"But best of all is a pina colada, the juice of a perfectly ripe pineapple -- a delicious drink in itself -- rapidly shaken up with ice, sugar, lime and Bacardi rum in delicate proportions. What could be more luscious, more mellow and more fragrant?"

So its seems that the Pina Fria and Pina Colada were available with, or without the addition of Rum. It doesn't really stretch the imagination to say that the Pina Colada could have been made by some people with or without Coconut as well.

New York Times (1857-Current file). New York, N.Y.: Apr 16, 1950. p. XX3 (1 page):

"Drinks in the West Indies range from Martinique's famous rum Punch to Cuba's pina colada (rum, pineapple and coconut milk)."

It is interesting that Trader Vic lists the Pina Colada without Coconut, and the Bahia with Coconut, as seperate drinks. I read somewhere that Trader Vic didn't like to use the name Pina Colada because it didn't sound "Tiki" enough, though that begins to sound like a bit of a dubious claim.

Cheers!

George

Try Mele-Koi Coconut Snow