2 minute read
Tiki drinks have always been a little theatrical, and that’s the whole point. They started at a kitschy bar in Depression-era Southern California called Don the Beachcomber, where Donn Beach piled rum, fresh juice, and garnishes into glasses big enough to share and charged people to forget their problems for a few hours. The trend jumped up the coast to Trader Vic’s, went national through franchising, peaked in the 1950s, nearly vanished in the 1960s, and then came roaring back in the 2000s when a new generation of bartenders decided the classics were worth keeping. That arc matters because it tells you what tiki cocktails actually are: approachable, fruit-forward, built for a crowd, and surprisingly hard to screw up at home.
Thursday Night Tiki Lounge: 52 Drinks that Bring the Tropics Home by Jennifer Newens leans into exactly that. The book delivers 52 recipes that mix tiki staples (Navy Grog, Zombie, Jungle Bird, Singapore Sling) with fresh takes like Kate’s Mai Tai and a Sexier Sex on the Beach. Every recipe runs on fresh juices, spiced syrups, and creative infusions, and the photography is good enough to make you want to start shaking before you’ve even read the ingredients list.
What I like about Newens’ approach is that she doesn’t assume you’re already stocked for a tiki bar. The book walks you through making your own cream of coconut, orgeat, and grenadine from scratch, which sounds like extra work but genuinely changes the flavor of the finished drink. Homemade orgeat alone is worth the effort.
Thursday Night Tiki Lounge is part of The Collective Book Studio’s Cheers to the Week series, which also includes Monday Night Mocktails and Wednesday Night Wine-Down, all aimed at home mixologists who want more than one go-to recipe. It’s out this May. If you’ve been looking for an excuse to finally stock a decent rum collection, this is it.
