The Halekulani–a whiskey-based sour with lemon, orange, pineapple, demerara sugar, grenadine, and bitters–has always intrigued me. Another non-rum tropical drink from Hawaiian hotel history, this one originated at the House Without a Key Lounge at Waikiki’s Halekulani Hotel. I decided to turn this into a stirred, spirit-forward drink–the result is a tropical Improved Cocktail with a nod to all of the original elements, plus our banana mix and a touch of absinthe.

This is one of those great drinks that sprang from the unique mix of ingredients on this month’s supply list. The resulting cocktail is a delightful 2:1 mezcal-and-gin martini with blanc vermouth, saline, optional spicy note, and a touch of honey. Keep a bottle of these in the freezer for when an afternoon outdoor hang turned into an all-evening affair and you suddenly have several thirsty friends at your house.

I developed this stirred cocktail recipe for a class I taught online back in March of 2022. Its flavor profile–smoky, honeyed, and bitter–was inspired by those first grilling sessions of spring. It’s strong enough to stand up to a cool evening but fits in well on a warm day, too.

The Improved Cocktail was a more complex take on the original formula of spirit, sugar, bitters, and water that first appeared in print in the appendix of Jerry Thomas’s 1876 edition. In 2021, I spent a lot of time with this genre and I produced a template from which I derived recipes for rye, genever, and Spanish brandy iterations. I was pleased to have the opportunity to design one with an aged rum base for this month’s theme.

The Mai Tai is Victor “Trader Vic” Bergeron’s most famous creation and one of the great drinks of the tiki canon. Rum expert Shannon Mustipher’s version offers the ingenious introduction of a small measure of unaged rhum agricole. I’ve made just a couple of slight alterations based on our supply list.

Ned King helped me immensely in planning this month, including bringing this post-WWII Zombie to my attention. Though different from the 1930s Zombie, this version reads as a direct descendent of Planter’s Punch. I’ve made a couple of changes to Ned’s spec based on what we have on hand this month.

This is an ode to the imaginary point in time, in this month’s period of interest (1900- 1919) when the prevailing Martini ratio was 2:1. Bright, briny fino or Manzanilla sherry works in perfect harmony with the blanco tequila, all of which is enhanced by a little salinity and citrus.

This is an update of a drink from earlier in my cocktail studies. It requires a ton of different ingredients, but it’s worth it. Big pine flavors go into this Cocktail that features a split base of rye and Irish whiskey.