Sacramento’s best tropical cocktails and tiki drinks

In this age of craft cocktails—those drinks comprising house-made bitters, shrubs and tonics—tropical drinks usually seem to merit little respect. Most serious bartenders practically boast that they don’t have a blender, and if you ask for a drink made with Malibu Rum liqueur, you’re likely to be turned away.

And don’t even think about asking for a wedge of pineapple or an umbrella garnish—especially if you’re someone of the male persuasion.

But that trend may be changing as more local bars embrace the history of the tropical and tiki cocktail, and it’s a rich history, indeed, full of colorful characters, lore and even a coded recipe.

The latter recipe detailed how to make the zombie, a tropical cocktail created by the legendary Donn Beach (born Ernest Gantt), who opened Don the Beachcomber, the original tiki bar, in Hollywood in 1934. In an attempt to keep his bartenders from sharing his secrets, Beach wrote out the recipe in numbers that corresponded to unlabeled bottles in the bar.

Such is the level of nerdery that can be achieved when delving into the subject. But are Sacramento bartenders nerding out on it, too?

When it comes to tropical, is artisanal the best way, or is the cabana boy sometimes your friend? Only Cocktail Challenge 3: Island Edition, which throws down 18 months after our last round of dares, can uncover such answers.

The challenge: Piña colada, mai tai

The results: When I ask the bartender to make me the most tropical drink he can think of, I sense a whiff of an attitude, but it turns out he’s just slow to warm up, and the piña colada he makes me is actually on the restaurant’s regular cocktail list. It’s actually called a Pinche Colada here and is made from pineapple, lime, two kinds of rum, and coconut gelato in lieu of a coconut liqueur or coconut cream, as is called for in the original recipe.

Right off the bat, we achieve liftoff: An umbrella is in effect. This makes me giddy—I don’t normally order tropical cocktails and didn’t know bars actually stocked umbrellas.

The coconut flakes in the gelato give the drink a not-unpleasant, slightly grainy texture, but it’s a touch too watery. The bartender also added lime to this traditionally three-ingredient drink, and the sharp tart flavor interferes with the mellow sweetness of the drink.

On another visit, I try another Hook & Ladder variation on a traditional tropical drink: the “Mai Taizner,” named for chef Brian Mizner. I was skeptical about the addition of habanero syrup, but I ended up asking for a bit more to turn up the heat. The drink had a strong almond flavor and a very pleasant bitterness that was brought out by the orgeat and syrupy curacao liqueur. It tasted almost nothing like a mai tai, but it’s a top-notch cocktail, nonetheless.

The challenge: Beachy shooters

The results: I was disappointed when I rolled up to the bar to find that the bar’s advertised $5 “Tiki Thursday” drinks were, in fact, shooters. Has anyone over the age of 22 ever done a shooter? The server said they could be ordered over ice to create cocktails of a sort. Either way, the shooters here sport wacky names such as Liquid Marijuana, Sex Under Da Sun and Surfer on Acid. The Red Beard, made up of Captain Morgan rum, grenadine, Malibu and Sierra Mist, tasted like cough syrup. The Liquid Marijuana was green, but that’s all it had going for it. Shockingly, the Surfer on Acid, with its combo of Jägermeister, Malibu and pineapple was the most palatable, with a pleasantish herbal flavor. The best part of these drinks came when I Instagrammed the absurd receipt (24 likes!).

The challenge: Zombie, mai tai

The results: Back on the topic of cocktail nerds, the minute I ask bartender Pete Tachibana to make a tropical cocktail, he starts in on a zombie, all the while spouting tiki-cocktail trivia.

Tachibana’s version of the zombie uses a mix of light, dark and gold rum, and falernum (a syrup with flavors of almond, ginger and lime). He also made a mai tai with Caliche rum, house-made curacao and Small Hands Foods orgeat syrup—none of that ho-hum Torani stuff here. The ingredients for this drink change seasonally, and on this day, it had muddled strawberries. It was certainly a pleasant, subtle, well-balanced cocktail. The problem with both drinks was that they were too smooth—almost aggressively smooth.

The challenge: Mai tai, zombie, piña colada

The results: I rolled into Frank Fat’s with a lady crew 15 deep on a Monday at happy hour. We had already been enjoying a daylong drinking spree, and the bartender was not amused by our shenanigans, to put it mildly. He did, however, serve a mai tai in a giant bowl with four straws, which you really can’t beat. He then made me a zombie, and when I asked him what was in it, he said, “The same as the mai tai except with more rum.” Not exactly a traditionalist. Both drinks tasted mostly of pineapple, but the zombie was indeed an ass kicker. I increased his displeasure by asking him to use the blender to make me a piña colada, which was overwhelmed by the taste of Malibu.

The challenge: Pineapple Painkiller, mai tai

The results: Buddy Newby recently instituted a Tuesday tiki night at Tank House and says the response has been positive, both from regulars and “new faces who might not have come in otherwise.” The bartender started the weekly event out of a love of tiki drinks and an effort to amuse himself in a bar that otherwise keeps it so simple when it comes to cocktails that they don’t even have a list. The Pineapple Painkiller uses real coconut cream rather than coconut liqueur and tasted like a rich, dessertlike juicy treat. It also has a generous quantity of rum, but the high alcohol is well-concealed. In contrast, the mai tai was decidedly on the boozy side, with multiple kinds of rum in it and a dark rum float on the top. Garnished with a lime slice, sprinkled with cinnamon and lit on fire, it’s clearly the win for presentation. I wished for an umbrella, but I guess then he would have had to call the drink The Flaming Umbrella.

The challenge: Zombie, Whiskey Colada, Mardi Gras

The results: Besides fruit juices and rum, the key to the enjoyment of tropical cocktails is water. Preferably gently slapping waves, but in Sacramento, the closest option is the river, where instead of schools of leaping dolphins, the Crawdad’s dock featured a tribal-tatted dude blowing his air horn to startle diners. Still, our table was dockside, and the restaurant has a bright and airy feel.

The zombie here, featured at the top of Crawdad’s cocktail list, uses both Sailor Jerry and Bacardi rum. This drink tasted strong, with a good balance between booze and sweet, juicy fruit. A Whiskey Colada, made with amaretto and Tullamore DEW whiskey instead of rum, tasted like a colada, but the amaretto added a pleasant nuttiness, and the coconut didn’t overpower. Meanwhile, the laundry list of liquor in the Mardi Gras approached Long Island iced tea territory (vodka and two kinds of rum), but the booze was drowned out by a fruity guava flavor.

As I drained my tulip glass, I watched a snowy egret take flight against the sunset, and the Delta breeze ruffled the paper umbrella I had tucked behind my ear. All my cares melted away, and I finally understood why Don the Beachcomber had dubbed the zombie the “mender of broken dreams.”

And, also, why his bar didn’t allow anyone to order more than two.

• Hook & Ladder Manufacturing Co. 1630 S Street, (916) 442-4885, www.hookandladder916.com

• R15 1431 R Street, (916) 930-9191, www.paragarys.com/sacramento-restaurants/r15-bar

• Grange Restaurant & Bar 926 J Street, (916) 492-4450, www.grangesacramento.com

• Frank Fat’s 806 L Street, (916) 442-7092, www.fatsrestaurants.com

• Tank House BBQ and Bar 1925 J Street, (916) 431-7199, http://tankhousebbq.com

• Crawdad’s River Cantina 1375 Garden Highway, (916) 929-2268, www.saccrawdads.com