Volta do Mar

We love gin-based tiki drinks, especially in the summer when the botanical elements of gin can help create cocktails that are especially refreshing and aromatic. We often fall back on our simple Tradewinds, a great example both of how tiki doesn’t need to be complicated and how gin can work well in a tiki drink.

We’ve dubbed this drink the Volta do Mar, and it is inspired by the Tradewinds cocktail. You’re probably saying to yourself that “Volta do Mar” doesn’t sound like a very tiki name for a cocktail. The name in Portuguese means literally “turn of/from the sea” and it was used to describe a sailing technique that allowed sailors to safely cross the Atlantic, and later the Pacific, oceans by navigating the trade wind patterns. You can read more about it here if you want to get into the logistics of this particular technique, but the name has a beatiful flow to it and, as this is a Tradewinds variation, it seems to be fitting.

The cocktail is really refreshing and tropical, with nice blend of orange and coconut that is fruity without being too sweet. One of the fun things about this cocktail is that many of the flavors appear in other tiki drinks – coconut, orange, lemon – but they’re combined in a new way here. The cocktail has a gin base and we used Beefeater 24, which uses grapefruit as one of its botanicals and pairs well with the curaco and orange twist that finishes off the drink. The Clement Mahina Coco liqueur is a favorite ingredient of ours, adding a subtly creamy coconut flavor that makes the cocktail exceptionally smooth.

Volta do Mar
2 oz London dry gin
3/4 oz Clement Mahina Coco liqueur
1/2 oz dry curacao
3/4 oz lemon juice
1/2 of simple syrup
orange twist

In a shaker or mixing glass, combine gin, coconut liqueur, dry curacao, lemon juice and simple syrup. Fill with ice and shake well. Strain into a double rocks glass filled with crushed ice. Finish with an orange twist, then garnish with the orange twist and an inside-out umbrella. Orchid optional.