How to Kill it at Mojitos

How to Kill it at Mojitos

OOOKAY! As usual, I'm a little late on these kinds of things, but welcome to summer everyone!

Now that it’s hot as f*ck out, it’s time for ice cold delicious summer dranks.  I bartended a party a few weeks ago where I must have made 100 mojitos, which is an excellent drink for sitting outside and sipping on a warm summer day.  And it inspired me to write this post.

WARNING: I'M GOING TO DROP SOME KNOWLEDGE ON YOU IN THIS POST THAT MOST BARTENDERS DON'T KNOW. 

If you know me, I insist on my cocktails being made awesome, and mojitos are easy to eff up because they have so many ingredients and steps.  Not quite the same

ballgame as cracking a Bud Light or pouring a gin and tonic, bro. 

Lets dive in, shall we?

Have you ever had a mojito where the sugar is all way on the bottom? Either just kind of sitting there or formed into a crust at the bottom of your glass? I agree... It's bullshit. 

That mojito wasn’t done awesome, it was done shitty.  In this post I'm going to cover a few little know details on how avoid this mistake and have your mojito be awesome.  Also, everything that I say in this post also goes for caipirinhas. 

I google searched "mojito recipe" and it got 16 million results. So I'm not going to cover that here. I'm going to talk the good stuff that you won’t get anywhere else.

Here’s the main thing:

The order in which you add the ingredients as well as when you muddle makes all of the difference.  Here's the order (I'm not going to include the qualities here because the rest of the internet is plastered with that stuff and everyone likes their mojito a little different):

 

Step 1: add the limes

Step 2: add the mint

Step 3: add the rum (the better the rum you use, the better your mojito)

Step 4: add the sugar

Adding the sugar last is the key detail.  Why, you ask?  Adding this last will give the sugar the best chance to dissolve. If you add it first, it can get stuck underneath the other ingredients and then just clump up at the bottom. 

As a bonus to our sugar dilemma, here is the reason to add the limes then mint.  If the mint goes in first, it just gets pressed against the bottom when you muddle.  If it is on top of the limes, it gets mushed up better and more of its flavor is released.  Delicious and refreshing.

Next step: muddle

By this time, the sugar should be pretty well dissolved.  But we’re not done yet! Next pour everything into the glass in which you will serve the drink.  This will help all of the ingredients, including the sugar, mix around some more. 

Now you can add ice and follow the remainder of your mojito recipe. A lot of times people add the ice too soon. This will chill the rum (a good thing) before the sugar has had sufficient opportunity to dissolve (a bad thing).  The colder the liquid, the less the sugar will dissolve.  Sugar dissolves best in warmer liquids, so don’t eff that up by adding ice too soon.

Boom.  How to have delicious cold mojitos on a hot summer day.

David

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