Daiquiri

The Cuban classic that Hemingway made famous—and not the frozen thing from the machine. White rum, fresh lime, and sugar shaken into three-ingredient perfection.

The Daiquiri takes its name from a small Cuban village, Daiquirí, located on the southeastern coast near Santiago de Cuba in what was then known as the Oriente province, where iron ore deposits attracted American mining investment in the late 19th century. Jennings Cox, an American mining engineer working for the Spanish-American Iron Company, is credited with creating the combination of local white rum, fresh lime juice, and sugar that became the Daiquiri, with the most cited account placing the occasion around 1898 during the period of American military and commercial presence following the Spanish-American War. Cox reportedly created the drink for American colleagues by improvising with available ingredients when other spirits were in short supply. The recipe was introduced to the United States by Rear Admiral Lucius W. Johnson, a U.S. Navy medical officer who encountered the drink in Cuba and introduced it at the Army and Navy Club in Washington, D.C. in 1909. Ernest Hemingway, who lived in Cuba from 1939 to 1960, became the Daiquiri's most famous devotee through his regular presence at La Floridita bar in Havana, where head bartender Constantino Ribalaigua Vert created the frozen Daiquiri format and developed specific versions for Hemingway including the Papa Doble (double rum, no sugar). The IBA recognizes the Daiquiri as a Contemporary Classic.