the bar you swim to, and a big drink for small problems
You left your hot pink Stanley — the one covered with stickers you collected at a book conference in New York — at the trailhead. There's sand all over the backseat that will still be there at Christmas. You have a tan line shaped like exactly one sandal strap, somebody said "pumpkin spice" out loud on August 12th, and the pool closes Labor Day whether you've used it or not.
Enter the Painkiller, a drink that takes your very small complaints seriously.
This tasty number was invented in the 1970s at a bar in the British Virgin Islands that had no dock. No dock, you ask? Right. To get a drink you swam ashore, which meant your money arrived wet, hence the name: the Soggy Dollar Bar. That may be the highest standard a beach bar can set. You have to actually want it.
The official Painkiller calls for Pusser's, a dark navy-style rum made the way the British Royal Navy issued it to sailors right up until 1970. Nutmeg, clove, caramel, a little leather taste. Swap in a light rum and you haven't made a Painkiller, you've made more of a Piña Colada with ambitions. Pusser's trademarked the name in the eighties, which tells us how seriously they take it.
Maybe you'll take it seriously, too. Maybe you won't. Either way, you'll like the amped-up pineapple and the cool name. And thinking about swimming to a bar out in the middle of the ocean, away from lost mugs, sand, and email.
Grate fresh nutmeg over the top. Not the jar. Ten seconds, like you mean it.
One note: it tastes like a fruit plate but does not behave like one. Pineapple and coconut cream are excellent liars. Make one, sit down somewhere, and let it get to work on that sandal tan. Make two…could be a whole different story.
Make one:
INGREDIENTS
- 2 ounces Pusser’s rum
- 4 ounces pineapple juice
- 1 ounce orange juice, freshly squeezed
- 1 ounce cream of coconut
- Add the rum, pineapple juice, orange juice and cream of coconut to a shaker with cubed ice and shake vigorously but briefly to combine.
- Strain into a hurricane glass or snifter over crushed ice.
- Garnish and serve with a straw.
- nutmeg, freshly grated
- pineapple wedge
Books, This N’ That, and a cocktail
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