To Serve Man
Rum

Test Pilot

Glass
Double Old-Fashioned

Donn Beach's two-rum signature laced with his trademark Pernod-and-bitters secret combination.

rum tiki classic mid-century shaken falernum jamaican
Scale
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Ingredients

  • fresh lime juice (0.5 oz)
  • falernum (0.5 oz)
  • Pernod (0.125 tsp)
  • Angostura bitters (1 dash)
  • Cointreau (3 tsp)
  • light Puerto Rican rum (0.75 oz)
  • dark Jamaican rum (1.5 oz)
  • crushed ice (0.5 cup)
  • mint sprig (1)
  • maraschino cherry (1)

Instructions

  1. In a shaker combine fresh lime juice, falernum, Pernod, Angostura bitters, Cointreau, light Puerto Rican rum, and dark Jamaican rum.
  2. Add crushed ice and flash blend or shake briefly.
  3. Pour unstrained into a double old-fashioned glass.
  4. Garnish with a mint sprig and a maraschino cherry.

Sources

  1. Berry, Sippin' Safari (2017 ed.), Test Pilot chapter, Berry's reconstruction of Donn Beach's c. 1941 Don the Beachcomber spec, including the Pernod / Angostura bitters / falernum signature combination that Donn called "Don's Mix" components. ↩
  2. "Test pilot (cocktail)." Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Test_pilot_(cocktail) (accessed 2026-05-03), secondary-source summary of the c. 1941 Donn Beach attribution and the multiple Berry-recovered variants; cited here as supporting context. ↩