In St Lucia, one of Earth's most idyllic and beautiful island, your drink choice is binary: Piton Beer or rum punch. The beer is fine, but the rum punch, with Caribbean white or light rum and lots of pineapple juice, is refreshing and always strong.
Piton Beer and Rum Punch in St Lucia
For authenticity, you want St Lucia's own Bounty Rum, which comes in white and light variants, but Bounty does not distribute in the US. A close substitute by both distance and taste is Barbados's Mount Gay.
Makes eight glasses.
Ingredients:
3 cups light rum
2 cups fresh pineapple juice
1 cup banana juice
1 cup fresh orange juice
1 cup fresh lime juice
1/2 cup grenadine syrup (recipe)
8 pineapple slices, to garnish
Combine all of the ingredients except the pineapple slices in a large pitcher or punch bowl. Stir well, cover, and refrigerate for at least two hours.
Serve in a lowball with large ice cubes. Garnish with a pineapple wedge.
Variation: It makes for a slightly different drink whether you use light or white rum—try both, or even try a mix. Lighter rums are certainly the more traditional route, but most of the premium pure cane bottlings—rums distilled from unmolested sugarcane and not from molasses and other byproducts—are slightly aged. 10 Cane follows that pattern: aged in oak for just a few months, it has an off-white hue. It is smooth and delicious, with a light shade that won't ruin the aesthetics of the punch. I recommend it.
When my wife & I make this rum punch, we are quickly taken back to St. Lucia where we enjoyed our honeymoon. The only difference in the way the locals told me they made the punch was to not use the banana juice (although a major cash crop on the island) and to use fresh ground nutmeg, which is also grown in St. Lucia.
ReplyDeleteHi, Anonymous! It is wonderful how food and drink can be transcendent, taking us to a different time and place.
ReplyDeleteI think the punch varies over the island. I did have variants with and without banana juice, but I never had punch in St Lucia with nutmeg!
My Anguillian Rum Punch features nutmeg, which was a frequent addition there, although I refine it a bit and incorporate it via a nutmeg-infused simple syrup.
However it is made, I love caribbean-style rum punch.
Yeah, the nutmeg was key. This stuff flows like water all over St. Lucia. In fact I just returned yesterday from there back home to California. I'm headed to the grocery store for some ingreedients. I can't let go of the place!
ReplyDeleteThe comment above is from another anonymous. Than the first. My name is Sam.
ReplyDeleteOn being Anonymous: Login with a Google account or select Name/Url to manually enter a Name, that way we can all identify your posts.
ReplyDeleteCan this be made virgin?
ReplyDeleteI don't see why not. Mix with sparkling water before serving.
ReplyDelete