To Serve Man
Cachaça

Caipirinha

Glass
Rocks

Brazil's national cocktail, three ingredients only: cachaça, lime, and sugar muddled together.

cachaça classic built lime sour
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Ingredients

  • lime
  • cane sugar (1.5 tbsp)
  • cachaça (2 oz)

Instructions

  1. Cut 1 fresh lime into 8 wedges and place in a sturdy rocks glass.
  2. Add cane sugar and muddle firmly to release the lime juice and dissolve the sugar against the lime peels. Do not over-muddle, the pith will turn it bitter.
  3. Add cachaça and fill the glass with cracked ice.
  4. Stir well to combine.

Sources

  1. "Caipirinha." Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caipirinha (accessed 2026-05-03), sources the 2003 Brazilian Cultural Heritage designation and the 19th-century Piracicaba (São Paulo state) origin story; paired here with the IBA spec for non-Wikipedia corroboration. ↩
  2. International Bartenders Association, "Caipirinha" (IBA Official Cocktails). https://iba-world.com/caipirinha/ (accessed 2026-05-03), the IBA standard at 50 ml (1.7 oz) cachaça with 2 tsp sugar, the spec the file's measurements are calibrated against. ↩