Port Antonio

I was looking for a rum drink that "puts hair on your chest." I found it with the Port Antonio. It came to my attention because the recipe calls for falernum, which I could make--and I think I will--but didn't have when I decided to mix the cocktail. I grabbed Velvet Falernum instead.

Falernum is a Barbados lime cordial used in making rum drinks a little more flavorful. It's made with a lot of lime zest, cloves, cinnamon, sugar--it's a tropical spice syrup! It comes in alcoholic varieties that use white rum to keep it shelf stable. Velvet Falernum is one of the alcoholic types, more of a liqueur than a cordial.

So the Port Antonio is a very Jamaican cocktail, and I made it with the country's most distinctive rums. Hamilton Pot Still rum is a gold rum with a lot of cane sugar flavors and a whiff of banana peel on the nose. Appleton Estate rum is an aged rum with a lot of oak and sugary character of its own. They play very well with Kahlua, which is also a rum based liqueur. Coffee is another of Jamaica's exports, so this drink has all the rum, lime and coffee of the tropical nation.

• 1 oz. gold rum (Hamilton Pot Still used)
• 1 oz. (Appleton Estate rum used)
• 1/2 oz. lime juice
• 1/2 oz. Kahlua 
• 1 tsp. falernum (Velvet Falernum used)
• lime slice

Combine all ingredients except lime slice in a shaker with ice. Shake and strain over fresh ice in an Old Fashioned glass. Garnish with lime slice.