The Planter’s Punch is one of that class of drinks with no fixed recipe. If you look in ten different places, you’ll likely find ten different formulations. Many books and databases even include several variations, giving each one a number.

I decided to look into the history of the Planter’s Punch to see if I could find a definitive or original recipe, but things don’t seem to be that clear. According to Wikipedia, the first known reference to a Planter’s Punch is in the August 8, 1908 edition of the New York Times, where a generic recipe is given as this little poem:

This recipe I give to thee,
Dear brother in the heat.
Take two of sour (lime let it be)
To one and a half of sweet,
Of Old Jamaica pour three strong,
And add four parts of weak.
Then mix and drink. I do no wrong —
I know whereof I speak.

Now I don’t know about you, but to me that seems like an invitation to improvise. The recipe gives four ingredients — lime, Jamaican rum, something sweet and something weak. Lime and rum are fixed, so we’re left with two ingredients to play with. Thankfully the measures were easy to translate into modern units, with each part being half-an-ounce in my interpretation.

For Sweet I decided early on to use my newly acquired Orgeat syrup (there’s a Mai Tai post coming soon when I can source the quality ingredients needed). I tried another version with a new homemade grenadine I’ve been toying with, but the Orgeat was somehow more satisfying. That may just be me favouring something new, though.

Weak is obviously some sort of fruit juice. Orange and pineapple are the usual suspects here, so I wanted a little change from that, but without going all out and using mango or passion fruit either. I settled on grapefruit juice as being out-of-the-ordinary enough without being cliché tropical.

For the rum, I cheated slightly because I found that the full given amount of dark Jamaican rum overpowered the drink. So I reduced the Jamaican rum to one ounce, and threw in some Havana Club Añejo 3 años for it’s distinctive nose and taste. I suppose that reading my new Beachbum Berry book arsenal is having an effect on me.

As to the name, it’s an allusion to the numbers given to variations I mention in the beginning of the post, joined with a rather geeky pop-culture reference.

Recipe:

1 oz. Dark Jamaican Rum
1/2 oz. Light Rum
3/4 oz. Sirop d’Orgeat
1 oz. Lime juice
2 oz. Grapefruit juice

Shake with plenty of cracked ice until you can’t feel the tips of your fingers, and serve in a large tall glass.

Notes:

The Orgeat is pretty pronounced, so you may want to reduce it to 1/2 oz. to make it more subtle. Either way, it’s a nice drink that’s refreshing and not too sweet.

I’ll also be trying this with a slightly less pungent Jamaican rum, and using the full 1 1/2 oz. to see how that works out.

Rating:

- Refreshing and different.

Hey Dave, where have you been?

On holiday, like I said in my previous post. Here, if you must know.

Did you get much cocktailing done?

Nope, my folks don’t have the same urge to store fifty different bottles at home that I do. Hell, they don’t even have a shaker.

Sounds like an excuse to present a crappy MxMonday drink…

Actually, I’ve been thinking about it for a two or three weeks. That doesn’t mean it’s any good, of course, it just means that this entry isn’t entirely improvised.

So what did you come up with?

Well, I considered being “original” and maybe doing something like the Brandy Alexander.

That’s the kind of “original” that everyone else thinks of too.

Exactly. So then I thought about maybe dusting off the Hummingbird or something similar.

Risky business, covering a cocktail you only published a few weeks ago…

Yup. Finally, I remembered that Barceló has a new rum cream and that I conveniently had a bottle purchased at my wife’s behest, so I decided to come up with something that uses it. I don’t know if it’s great, but at least it’s mine. And I even came up with a cool name.
What’s this rum cream like?

It’s made using Dominican aged rum, in a recipe I suspect is similar to most other cream liqueurs. This rum is apparently aged in Bourbon casks for a length of time before being used to make this cream. Barceló’s aged rum is actually quite nice on it’s own, and the rum cream is also decent. It’s not something that comes at you, though. It’s basically just Bailey’s with rum.

What can you possibly mix that with?

Remember we’re talking rum here, so I wanted something traditionally tropical but also creamy. Coconut cream fits the bill perfectly.

Interesting, I can’t find any recipe on Google that combines those two ingredients.

Neither could I, possibly with good reason… Anyway, I finally needed a hint of sweetness and flavour to contrast with the existing profile, so I added a little Amaretto. Maybe it’s the easy way out, but it works fairly well.

And since it’s a tropical drink, we’re talking blender here.

Great. By the way, what’s with the name you’ve given it?

Coco Blanco is the name of a bird native to Santo Domingo, which is where Barceló rum hails from. You may know it, it’s called the White Ibis in English. Also, the drink uses coconut and comes out white, so it’s a kind of play on words.

Well, are you going to make us a couple or what?

Coming right up…

Recipe:

1 1/2 oz. Rum Cream
2 oz. Coconut Cream
1/4 oz. Amaretto

In a blender, mix the rum cream and coconut cream with about half-a-cup of ice. Blend until smooth, serve into a wide glass and pour a splash of amaretto into the glass using a spoon to spread it out over the surface. The idea is to get it to streak slightly when stirred using the straw.

Notes:

You have to be careful with two things here.

Both the rum cream and coconut cream have relatively delicate flavours, so if you overdo the ice it’s going to get watery and tasteless. However, if you don’t add enough ice, the drink is going to be too sweet. A hint: It’s called a Coco Blanco, so the drink should be white before adding the amaretto. If it’s rum cream colour, then you need more ice.

Also, be very careful not to overdo the amaretto. If you get it just right, it should add to the drink without taking over. It’s way too easy to pour in too much, so start with a little and work up from there. You shouldn’t need more than half a tablespoon.

Rating:

I can’t rate my own drink, although my wife seems to like it and has already tasked me with making it next time we have friends around. Let me know what you think in the comments.

Visit Morsels & Musings for the rest of the Mixology Monday entries.