Where can I get a good Mai Tai?
This is actually a harder question to answer than you think. For many bars, a Mai Tai is their token tropical drink that has rum, pineapple juice and grenadine. Then there are tiki bars that know how to make a true 1944 Trader Vic’s Mai Tai, but the results range from great, to good, to passable, to “is this even a Mai Tai?”. I’ve been into tiki for a long time and had my share of Mai Tais which all taste drastically different. It’s only been more recently that I can pin down exactly what a Mai Tai should taste like and I’ve got to thank Kevin Crossman for that! Kevin’s website, The Search for The Ultimate Mai Tai, is a one stop resource that ranks and rates all the places that Kevin has had a Mai Tai. Check out The Search for The Ultimate Mai Tai and you will learn where you can find …
The Good, The Bad, and The Ultimate Mai Tai!
What is the tiki scene like where you live?
Kevin- I’m in the suburbs of the San Francisco Bay Area, and depending on how you categorize them, we’re blessed with 15-20 tiki bars within easy driving distance. In San Francisco and in the Oakland area there are eight or nine that are legitimately top tier tiki bars.
That said, I’m in southern Alameda County in an area I like to call the Tiki Wasteland because there aren’t any really good ones that are really close. So, we have to travel 30 minutes plus to get to the really good tiki bars. Or, to hang out in the many home tiki bars that people have created. Those are a lot of fun too, and several I’ve been to compare quite legitimately to the commercial places.
A few of these tiki bars have regular “Ohana” night meetups, so I often will try to visit on those nights. The Kon-Tiki in Oakland is my most frequent hangout because it is only a block from BART. It is very easy for me to catch BART to get up and back. And the 30-minute train ride back does help sober me up a little.
What brought you into the ‘Tiki lifestyle” and how long has it been part of your life?
Kevin- I’ve been interested in different forms of music for a long time. My favorite band as a young adult was Oingo Boingo, who often used exotic instrumentation and percussion. I was also interested in soundtrack scores. During the Lounge revival in the 1990s I listened to the Mondo Exotica compilation (from the Capitol Records Ultra-Lounge series) and immediately saw how this music was a precursor to some of the other music I was listening to, and I was immediately hooked.
So, I kind of got into Tiki via the music side. I had also visited Hawaii and was fascinated by the Mai Tai, so naturally that became the default drink for me when I visited a tiki bar.
I was pretty active in the late 1990s, but once I started having kids I turned to different hobbies. I hosted a couple podcasts starting in 2005 and also ran a website devoted to the Frat Pack. As I approached my 50th birthday I decided I wanted to throw a “Hawaii 5-0” party, and that got me back into trying more cocktails at home and also making more of a point to visit tiki bars. The Smuggler’s Cove book had come out and that was definitely an influence to rekindle my interest. And now I’m in full on lifestyle mode.
When and what made you decide to start blogging about Tiki, or more specifically, Mai Tai’s?
Kevin- I had a couple “weird” or “niche” websites back in the 1990s, including Lip Balm Anonymous which garnered a bit of notoriety. I was even the subject of a two-part investigative report on The Daily Show. Since I was getting more interested in tiki during that time, I decided to build a website devoted to trying to find the ultimate Mai Tai.
The original Search for the Ultimate Mai Tai website launched in late 1998 and I had a friend build a low-tech submission tool for people to send in review and trip reports. It was kind of like a prototype Critiki back in the day.
Once I started getting back into tiki I noticed my personal Instagram feed was leaning too much into tiki and I thought I’d create a new account with a focus on tiki stuff and to also kind of relaunch the “Search for the Ultimate Mai Tai” brand. That was in late 2017 and I felt like I wanted to try and post each day. And not just a photo but at least a little bit of a blog-style write-up. Things like trip reports, experiments with cocktails, shout-outs to things happening in tiki culture, etc. The Bar Faith Instagram account was definitely an inspiration. Instagram definitely seemed to be the place where there were the most eyeballs and also easy ways for people to comment and connect.
But I also found myself wanting to have a website to document some of my travels and especially to document the Mai Tai. So, I recently set up a new Search for the Ultimate Mai Tai website and blog. The blog side is mostly reposts from Instagram, though I do have some unique posts that don’t lend themselves to Instagram, such as the regular Mai Tai in Popular Culture feature where we highlight notable places where the Mai Tai shows up in TV, music, etc.
In your opinion, who serves the “Ultimate” Mai Tai? What makes a Mai Tai great?
Kevin- Well, in theory this is a never-ending quest. The best Mai Tais follow the original 1944 recipe and I’ve had many great ones. These days, there are so many quality rums on the market, so it’s pretty easy for a bar to use a good rum in their Mai Tai.
My favorite rum for a one-rum Mai Tai is Appleton 12, so when I’m at a new bar I’ll try their house Mai Tai but often order a second just with Appleton 12. That’s what happened when we visited Rumba in Seattle. Their house Mai Tai was excellent, but to me it was even better with just the Appleton 12 rum. Don’t be afraid to go to a bar and ask for a cocktail using a different rum.
My tastes have evolved a bit over the years and I really do favor the “English Style” rums, especially Jamaican rums. I don’t mind Rhum Agricole as much as I used to, but generally I don’t love it in my Mai Tai. That said, I had a great Mai Tai at Latitude 29 in New Orleans. Beachbum Berry knows his stuff.
My current “Fremont Mai Tai” rum blend is equal parts Appleton 12, Smith & Cross, Plantation Xaymaca, and Plantation OFTD. When I completed the rum club at Kon-Tiki in Oakland they put together a special menu for the evening and labeled this as “The Ultimate Mai Tai” in my honor. I honestly can say that was a truly great Mai Tai! But of course, it was tuned to my exact palette.
As long as a Mai Tai uses quality ingredients and fresh lime juice it should be pretty good. I’ve had some bad experiences at bars when they use falernum instead of orgeat, or use weird tasting orgeat or curacao, but luckily that’s pretty rare these days. If it says 1944 Mai Tai on the menu, it’s likely to be very good.
What is your favorite Tiki bar?
Kevin- There are so many great ones to choose from. But some of them are small or have seating issues or particularities with the service or clientele. So, if you’re asking for my “favorite” I’m going to lean to some places that are always large enough to guarantee a place to sit when I visit.
My favorite to hang out at is the Kon-Tiki in Oakland. Their drinks are excellent, and it honestly doesn’t hurt that the bartenders know me and kind of tweak the recipes more to my palette. I love their amazing Cheeseburger – the best I’ve ever had. And I do enjoy that they lean a little bit more into some other retro musical styles such as Yacht Rock. The music there is definitely a bit groovier than some tiki bars.
But if I could save only one tiki bar from destruction? That would be Trader Vic’s in Emeryville. This was the last Vic’s location that the Trader himself had a hand in building and I really enjoy my visits there. I love the food and drinks, and the more old-school service style. I love that they still have a great supply of Trader Vic’s merchandise for purchase, and all the tikis inside. And, you know, the Mai Tai!
What does the future hold for you and your blog?
Kevin- We officially launched the new ultimatemaitai.com website on February 1st, 2020. We have some “Tiki Travels” pages for a few localities including Seattle, Hawaii and Palm Springs. But I want to expand these travel pages. I visited 52 tiki bars in 2019 and there are definitely a few I want to write more about for the website.
I’d also like to continue to host long-form content like essays and interviews. We pulled a few of these from the old website and we’ll definitely do more.
Anything else you would like to add?
Kevin- My wife Julie (“Mrs. Mai Tai”) has been a pretty good sport about all of this tiki stuff, so a lot of this wouldn’t have happened without her support.
It was a little bit of effort to get acquainted with people in a very established social scene when I started getting back into tiki a couple of years ago. Especially since I’m a little reserved and usually won’t just run up to someone to talk to them. I appreciate that many people have had long-term relationships, so it isn’t always easy to make new friends. So, I’d like to thank a few people who really helped me get introduced to folks in the community. These include Brenda Gadow, Terry Lee Mosley, Josh Miller, and of course you too Ray. I have tried to return the favor when I’ve seen some new tikiphiles joining the community.
The Search for the Ultimate Mai Tai website