Rum

Pago Pago

Name: Pago Pago
Yield: 1 servings

Glass: Coupe

A 1940 daiquiri-shaped gem with green Chartreuse, white crème de cacao, and muddled pineapple.

rum tiki pre-tiki shaken pineapple daiquiri-variant revival

Ingredients

pineapple
green Chartreuse (0.5 oz)
white creme de cacao (0.25 oz)
fresh lime juice (0.75 oz)
Jamaican white rum (2 oz)
pineapple frond

The Pago Pago is a daiquiri-shaped cocktail with green Chartreuse, white crème de cacao, and muddled fresh pineapple, first printed in Hyman Gale and Gerald Marco's 1940 The How and When (a Ronrico-underwritten bar book).¹^,² The 1940 original specified gold Puerto Rican (Ronrico Red) rum; the spec below uses Jamaican white rum, which is a modern craft adaptation popularized in the 2010s–2020s revival (Paul McGee and others), not a recovery of the 1940 print.²^,³ The drink does not appear in any of Trader Vic's published books.³ The muddled pineapple is the structural twist: it gives the drink fresh fruit body that a juiced version can't reproduce.

Brand recommendations. Best: Wray & Nephew White Overproof or Rum Fire Jamaican white rum, genuine green Chartreuse, Tempus Fugit or Marie Brizard white crème de cacao. Economical: Plantation 3 Stars (a blend with Jamaican white) or Appleton Estate Signature, green Chartreuse (no real substitute, Dolin Génépy can stand in at lower complexity), DeKuyper white crème de cacao.

Instructions

In a shaker, muddle 4 quarter-sized chunks of fresh pineapple with green Chartreuse and white creme de cacao.
Add fresh lime juice, Jamaican white rum, and ice.
Shake vigorously until well chilled and double-strain into a chilled coupe.
Garnish with a small flower or pineapple frond.

Sources

Hyman Gale & Gerald Marco, The How and When (1940), the printed source of the Ronrico-promoted Pago Pago recipe. ↩
Berry, Beachbum Berry Remixed (2010), Pago Pago entry, Berry's recovery / republication of the 1940 spec, the source of the file's measurement bill. ↩
Verified absence: no "Pago Pago" entry appears in Bergeron's Bartender's Guide (1947), Trader Vic's Bartender's Guide, Revised (1972), or Trader Vic's Book of Food and Drink (1946), the drink is not part of the Vic catalog despite the persistent online attribution loops; sourcing rests entirely on the 1940 Gale & Marco / Ronrico printing and Berry's Remixed recovery. ↩