Kingston Cocktail (1925)
Jamaican rum shaken with orange juice, caraway-flavored kümmel and a dash of allspice liqueur. Served in a small, chilled glass.
- Original yieldYield
- 1 cocktail1 cocktail
- PrepPrep time
- TotalTotal time
Published Updated
Original recipe: 1 cocktail
The story behind the recipe
The Kingston combines rum and orange with the caraway flavor of its kümmel liqueur; a dash of pimento dram adds allspice. It's a short, aromatic drink for someone who enjoys the spice cupboard as much as the fruit bowl.
Two liqueurs before you start
Kümmel is a sweet caraway-flavored liqueur. Depending on the bottle, aniseed and other seed spices may join it. If caraway makes you think of bread, that familiar association is a good way to picture its savory edge against fresh orange juice.
Pimento dram is an allspice liqueur. “Pimento” here means the allspice berry, not a pepper. Its aroma suggests several warm spices, including clove, cinnamon and nutmeg, which helps explain the name allspice. A very small addition can be noticeable.
These are worth identifying before putting Kingston on a party menu. Neither is a neutral sweetener, and leaving one out changes what the drink offers. The ingredient list is short, but you'll need both liqueurs.
Read more about this recipe
The 1925 authors noticed them too
Nina Toye and A. H. Adair singled out kümmel and pimento dram in their Kingston recipe in Drinks: Long and Short, page 21. Rum gets half the main mixture, and kümmel and orange juice share the rest equally.
The book otherwise makes room for brewed tea, coffee and breakfast marmalade. Kingston shows the more specialized end of the same home drinks cupboard: domestic mixing could mean a preserving jar or an unfamiliar liqueur. The article on the collection follows that range.
Its simple 2:1:1 relationship makes the mixture easy to remember once the ingredients are out. Rum is the largest pour, with enough juice to bring fresh fruit into the drink without turning it into a long punch.
Rum behind the seeds and spice
A pot-still or aged Jamaican rum is the starting point. Its flavor has to share the glass with two assertive liqueurs. Color alone won't tell you how a bottle tastes, so choose by the style and flavor you want, not by how dark it looks.
Orange juice softens the mixture and contributes its own aroma. Heavy pulp can make the short serving coarse, so strained juice is specified. A light froth from shaking can appear at the surface; it will settle as the drink waits.
The sweetness comes mainly with the liqueurs. There's no separate sugar syrup to prepare and no elaborate fruit garnish to arrange. That makes the actual serving straightforward even when choosing the bottles took more thought.
Watch the pimento dash
The book gives one dash of pimento dram for six people. This recipe uses one dash for one drink, making the allspice much more prominent. The main proportions are preserved, but that seasoning is a deliberate increase.
Dashes vary with the bottle and its spout. If the dram is particularly pungent, the smaller-drop option in the notes keeps it closer to the source's light seasoning. When you're making the historical six-person batch, keep its one dash total separate from the six dashes used for six modern servings.
A chilled coupe leaves the mixture open to the nose, where caraway and allspice are easy to meet. Serve it without garnish. The two liqueurs have already brought the interesting part.
Make it your wayOriginal: 1 serving · Makes 1 cocktail
Original recipe: 1 cocktail
Ingredients
For 1 cocktail. Quantities are shown as written.
Source measurement convention: US customary. Explicit unit definitions take precedence; unconfirmed measures must be checked before conversion.
Original quantities for 1 cocktail.
- Jamaican rum (pot-still or aged)1 1/4 fl oz
- Kümmel liqueur5/8 fl oz
- Fresh orange juice, strained5/8 fl oz
- Pimento Dram1 dash
Measurement notes
- Jamaican rum (pot-still or aged), Kümmel liqueur, fresh orange juice, strained: US fl oz: 1 = 29.5735 ml (rounded).
Measurement notes
Original ingredients
- 1 1/4 fl oz Jamaican rum (pot-still or aged)US fl oz: 1 = 29.5735 ml (rounded).
- 5/8 fl oz Kümmel liqueurUS fl oz: 1 = 29.5735 ml (rounded).
- 5/8 fl oz fresh orange juice, strainedUS fl oz: 1 = 29.5735 ml (rounded).
- 1 dash Pimento Dram
Equipment
Cocktail shaker
Hawthorne strainer
Coupe glass
Fine-mesh strainer
Jigger or measuring glass
Instructions
Combine the drink ingredients
Combine the Jamaican rum, Kümmel liqueur, fresh orange juice, strained, and Pimento Dram in a cocktail shaker.
Add ice and shake
Add the cracked ice, seal tightly, and shake hard for 12 to 15 seconds until the shaker is frosty and a light citrus froth forms.
Strain into a chilled coupe
Strain through a Hawthorne strainer into a chilled coupe glass.
Serve while frothy
Serve immediately while the drink is fresh and crowned with citrus froth.
Estimated calories 150 kcal
Nutrition portion: whole recipe · Original yield: 1 cocktail
Source & assumptions
Ingredient-based estimate using CoFID 2021, USDA SR Legacy (2018), a sugar-and-alcohol energy model using Combier’s published Kümmel composition, NIST ethanol density and FAO energy factors. About 150 kcal per nutrition portion (whole recipe). Uses a representative 40% ABV Jamaican-rum baseline. Kümmel calories are modeled from Combier’s published 38% ABV and 225 g/L sugar composition. The small Pimento Dram dash is estimated at 1 ml using a medium-strength sweet-liqueur reference; its actual brand and dash size may change the estimate by a few calories. Actual ingredients and preparation affect the estimate.
Recipe notes
When adjusting quantities
This single serving uses 1 dash per drink for practical home measuring, creating a noticeably spicier profile. To mix a six-person batch matching this one-dash-per-person adaptation, combine 7 1/2 fl oz rum, 3 3/4 fl oz Kümmel, and 3 3/4 fl oz strained orange juice with 6 dashes of Pimento Dram. To mix a historical six-person batch matching the original subtle seasoning, use the same liquid volumes but only 1 dash of Pimento Dram total.
Original recipe notes
These notes describe the original recipe. Quantities mentioned here do not change when you adjust servings.
Adapted from Toye and Adair, Drinks: Long and Short (1925), p. 21: original book. The 2:1:1 rum:kümmel:orange ratio is retained. One dash of pimento dram per drink is six times the original dash per six-person batch. If yours is especially pungent, use a small drop from a barspoon for lighter seasoning.
Use strained fresh orange juice to keep heavy pulp out of the small serving. The scaling note gives separate amounts for the modern and historical six-person batches; don't combine their dash instructions.
Read the scaling guide. Times, temperatures and equipment need their own consideration. Open the recipe tool to review and correct individual amounts.
Sources and attribution
Nina Toye & A. H. Adair, Drinks: Long and Short (London: William Heinemann, 1925), p. 21.
Recipe details
- Recipe tradition
- Vintage
- Course or meal
- Drink
- Cuisine
- Other / International
- Source decade
- 1920s
- Browse category
- Drinks & Cocktails