Bahama Mama Cocktail History

The Bahama Mama is a colorful and refreshing rum cocktail that comes, unsurprisingly, from the Bahamas, though no-one seems to know its history for sure.

History of the Bahama Mama

The fact that it comes from the Bahamas is pretty much all we know about the origins of the Bahama Mama rum cocktail. The Bahama Mama in question was a calypso singer and dancer named Dottie Lee Anderson, who performed in the Bahamas and around the Caribbean in the 1930s. Whether the drink was invented then, or was created later and named after her catchy stage name, we don’t know.

Who Invented the Bahama Mama?

The person who claims to have invented the drink is a Bahamian bartender and mixologist named Oswald Greenslade, who worked at the Nassau Beach Hotel. He wrote a book called One More Cocktail: A Guide to Making Bahamian Cocktails. Among the staggering 1,078 cocktail recipes in the book are drinks like the Splish Splash and Bikini Below the Knees. In his recipe for the Bahama Mama, Greenslade says that he did indeed invent the drink.

However, on his website the author says he started working and making cocktails at the Nassau Beach Hotel in 1961, but the Bahama Mama was already a popular cocktail in the 1950s. Greenslade’s recipe may have been his own original variation on a drink that already existed.

Prohibition Cocktail?

Some people even say that the drink goes back to the time of Prohibition in the United States, when the Bahamas was a popular spot for smuggling alcohol into the USA. The Bahamas is only about 130 miles from Miami and the east Florida coast.

What Is a Bahama Mama?

There’s no definitive recipe for the Bahama Mama, but there are basically two different variants. One uses coffee liqueur, to produce a coffee-colored drink, while the other uses grenadine, to produce a vivid red drink, depending on the amount of grenadine used and how you prepare the drink. It’s also possible to make a Bahama Mama so that the grenadine stays at the bottom of the glass, making it look more like a Tequila Sunrise.

Bahama Mama Recipe

There are usually two types of rum in a Bahama Mama, including at least one dark rum, although some recipes even use three different ones. As the recipe usually calls for the taste of coconut and/or pineapple, you can achieve the effect by using a coconut- or pineapple-flavored rum as one of the rums. Some people also like to use a dash of over-proof rum as the third rum, to give the drink an alcoholic boost.

The Bahama Mama is one of those recipes you can experiment with, to develop your ‘house’ version. It’s also a good drink for making in large batches and serving in a pitcher on a warm summer day, with more ice standing by.

Bahama Mama Rum Cocktail Recipe — Bahama Mama Rum Cocktail Ingredients

Classic Bahama Mama Recipe

Ingredients

0.5 oz. dark rum
0.25 oz. 151 proof rum (75.5% ABV) such as Goslings Black Seal Rum 151
0.5 oz. coconut liqueur
0.25 oz. coffee liqueur, like Kahlua
4 oz. pineapple juice
1 oz. lemon juice

Method

Combine all the ingredients in a cocktail shaker and shake vigorously
Strain into a Collins glass over ice and your choice of garnish: a cherry, an orange slice, a pineapple wedge, a strawberry, or some mint sprigs.