FOOD HISTORY: The Pina Colada

The Pina Colada is one of the world’s most favorite mixed drinks. Pina Colada, in Spanish means, "strained pineapple" and it was developed in Puerto Rico.  While the current recipe is from the 1950s, some say the name didn't originate until the 1960s. However, Puerto Rican folklore suggests that a predecessor drink, consisting of rum, Pineapple juice, and coconut was served by the Puerto Rican pirate, Roberto Confesi as a morale booster for his crew, however, when he was captured and killed in 1825, his original recipe disappeared. Further, at the beginning of the 20th century, a drink called  "Pina Fria" (cold pineapple) was mentioned in the pages of US newspapers as a "Pineapple Aide" drink and in 1952, a recipe consisting of "two fingers of cold, fresh  Pineapple juice blended with 1.5 oz. of rum plus 1/2 teaspoon of sugar." was published in the NY Herald Tribune. While several versions of rum/ pineapple juice containing beverages appeared between Confesi's version and those of the early1950's, it was not until 1954, when a key ingredient - Coco Lopez - a premade coconut cream - was invented. Ramon Lopez-Irrizarry, born in Cabo Rojo, Puerto Rico, was a Professor of Agricultural Sciences at the University of Puerto Rico who was given the grant to develop items to boost Puerto Rican agricultural industries. One of his projects was to find an easier way to extract the cream from coconut pulp; the coconut is an important ingredient in preparing many Puerto Rican desserts. The current extraction methods were too long and costly. Lopez-Irrizarry discovered an easier method by blending the cream from the hearts of coconuts with an exact proportion of natural sugar. He named his sweetened, coconut cream product Coco Lopez. It immediately had an impact on the island's culinary scene and became very popular. The invention of Coco Lopez plus a technological advance in kitchen gadgetry - the introduction of the kitchen blender - gave rise to the Pina Colada that we know it today. The Caribe Hilton Hotel in San Juan, Puerto Rico is the source of two versions of where and by whom, the Pina Colada was originally concocted. The first is that in 1954, a bartender named Ramon "Monchito" Marrero Perez,, worked for three months developing this as a signature drink for the hotel and he continued to serve Pina Coladas until his retirement in the late1980's.  However, Ricardo Garcia, another bartender in the same hotel at the same time, claimed that he was the one who added strained Pineapple juice to the drink and gave the drink its name. Garcia was the first bartender to serve the cocktail in a hollowed-out coconut. To complicate things further, the Restaurant Barrachina in San Juan, also claims to be the place where the Pina Colada was born when the owner convinced a Spanish mixologist from Argentina, Ramon Portas Mingot, to become his head bartender.  The owner claimed it was this bartender who first started serving the drink to their patrons in 1963. Putting aside the controversy as to where, when, and by whom the first "modern' Pina Colada was developed, the Pina colada has become the national drink of Puerto Rico, is popular in all Spanish and Portuguese speaking countries and is enjoyed all over the world, as well.