Daiquiri with a dried lime wheel.
The daiquiri is the test. Three ingredients, rum, lime, sugar, and nowhere to hide a mistake. Get the balance right and it's one of the finest things you can pour. Get it wrong and you'll know on the first sip. Forget the frozen, blended version; the real one is shaken, sharp, and served up.
A fresh lime wedge here just gets in the way, sinking and bleeding pith into a drink that lives or dies on precision. A dried lime wheel floats clean on top, holds its shape, and adds rind aroma without nudging the balance off.
What you'll need
- 60ml white rum
- 25ml fresh lime juice
- 15ml sugar syrup (1:1 sugar to water)
- 1 dried lime wheel
- Ice, to shake
How to make it
- In a shaker, combine the rum, lime juice, and sugar syrup. Fill with ice.
- Shake hard for 10 seconds. The daiquiri wants to be very cold and a touch frothy.
- Strain into a chilled coupe. No ice in the glass; this drinks short and up.
- Float a dried lime wheel on the surface to finish.
Why dried beats fresh here
A fresh lime slice waterlogs and tips the drink towards bitterness as it sits. A dried lime wheel keeps its oil in the rind, sits cleanly on top, and looks as sharp at the last mouthful as the first. In a drink this exact, you don't want a garnish quietly changing the recipe.
If your limes are tart, pull the sugar back to 12ml and taste before you pour. The balance should land somewhere between sour and sweet, never on either side of it.
Use the Lime jar, about 25 wheels, enough for a whole summer of daiquiris.