Mai Tai - the making of a legend

 

The Mai Tai has become as synonymous with Hawaii as surfing, but it actually was born in California, one of more than ninety drinks created in the 1930s and 1940s by Donn Beach, an accomplished chef, avid globe-trotter and successful entrepreneur.

Beach owned a bar called Don's Beachcomber, located in a cozy thirteen-by-thirty-foot space adjacent to the McCadden Hotel in Hollywood. "He loved to experiment with flavours and blends", says Arnold Bitner, who's written a biography of Beach and is married to Beach's widow, Phoebe. "He was born and raised in and around the bayou of Louisiana, had lived in Jamaica, and had traveled extensively so he knew a lot about different foods and drinks".

Many people have wine cellars, Bitner notes, but Beach boasted a rum cellar stocked with more than 140 rums from around the world. In 1933, he started concocting a slew of original rum drinks, including an after-dinner libation named Mai Tai Zwizzle. "Ironically, as we look back on it, it wasn't his personal favourite", says Bitner.

Beach had long nurtured a love for Hawaii and made a permanent move to the Islands after World War II. In 1947, he opened a cluster of thatched-roof bars and restaurants in Waikiki, including the legendary Don the Beachcomber, next to what is now the International Market Place. The Mai tai came with him, and the rest, as they say, is history.