How About A Hurricane For Mardi Gras?

Tomorrow is Mardi Gras and those who celebrate may just be looking for cocktails and other goodies in which to indulge before the fasting season of Lent. Others may just want to drink! We had a request for a Mardi Gras cocktail and I thought the perfect choice would be the Hurricane, a World War II-era cocktail created at Pat O'Brien's in New Orleans. The story goes that it was difficult to get certain liquors during that period, but that rum was plentiful, so bar owners were forced to accept huge supplies of rum along with their whiskies and scotches, which were more popular at the time. As you'll see, this cocktail is the perfect way to use up large amounts of surplus rum!

As with just about any cocktail, there are as many ways to make it as there are recipes and guides. One of our favorites, Jeff "Beachbum" Berry, lists the recipe in his Grog Log with only three ingredients: dark Jamaican rum, passion fruit syrup and lemon juice. Dark Jamaican rum would be my personal preference, but I've made it here with gold rum, since that's what Pat O'Brien's calls for on their website. They also call for their proprietary Hurricane mix, which I don't have, so I went with passion fruit and lemon for the rest. Their drink also has a distinct red color and many recipes do call for grenadine. I added a touch of grenadine to mine, but our grenadine is brownish since we make our own with actual pomegranate and it didn't add a red tint. If you really want that red color, either food color or a commercial grenadine (which likely has food color) will give you the look you desire!

Hurricane (our hybrid version)

4 oz gold or dark Jamaican rum

2 oz passion fruit syrup

2 oz fresh lemon juice

A dash of grenadine (optional)

Shake all ingredients with ice and strain into a hurricane glass with ice.

By the way, the name "Hurricane" supposedly comes from the shape of the glass - like a hurricane lamp. Laissez les bon temps rouler!