The Perfect Mojito

So a while ago, Dave and I were talking about how fast mint grows, and what one does with all that mint. I said "Mojitos! They're so 2001!". But apparently mojitos are still trendy, because they're featured on Bacardi commercials right now.

My first mojito recipe came from a May 2002 issue of Cooking Light, and is the one I've been using. Ten mint leaves, 2 tsp sugar, 2 oz. light rum, 2 tbsp. fresh lime juice, and 6 oz. club soda. All in all, I'm happy with this version of the mojito. Dave's is slightly sweeter and has less lime juice, and he's happy with his too. We've both working on the mint squishing so that we don't break up the leaves too much.

So I looked online to see if there was a general consensus on mojito making. There isn't. Lots of the recipes I found were much sweeter, some used less lime, some used a sugar syrup instead of granulated sugar. Some recipes have lots less club soda, and it seems that adding more soda has been part of the "Americanization" of the drink. And then to make it more confusing, someone who claimed he knew what he was doing said that you should actually start with lime slices and muddle them in the glass with the mint and sugar to release lime essential oils, and forget about lime juice entirely. Someone else said it's actually better with dark rum instead of light.

Now it pays to bear in mind that neither Dave nor I have ever had a mojito made for us at any bar, or in Cuba, or anywhere else. We're going on our innate gringo mojito instinct, which probably is about as strong in us as say, The Force.

So tonight the mojito experiments begin. I don't know what'll be going down at Dave's house, but I have grand plans to refine my mojito into the perfect (for me) drink.