It’s World Cocktail Day on Friday 13th May! Apart from giving you even more of an excuse to go out for cocktails this Friday, it’s a celebration of the wonderful world of mixed drinks. In recognition of this, we sourced some data, ran our own survey, and can reveal what the UK’s favourite cocktail is in 2016.
And the winner is…The Mojito! A refreshing drink, ideal for sipping in beautiful weather, or on a beach (hardly what the UK is known for!), however we can see why it’s a firm favourite with its delicious blend of rum, mint, lime and sugar. It was closely followed by the Cosmopolitan and the Espresso Martini, the later having quickly gained popularity with many across the UK especially in London and Leeds, maybe it’s the longer working hours in London leading more to need that espresso hit!
In terms of gender, men and women both agreed on their favourite (the Mojito) but men were more swayed towards shorter drinks such as the Negroni or Old Fashioned where as women tended to go for the longer drinks or fruitier cocktails. No stereotype busting here we’re sorry to say, but don’t blame us, blame the data!
We saw that those aged 18-24 preferred a wider variety of cocktails, with many naming more specific cocktails that are not yet household names. We saw a slight correlation that as the age increased the variation in favourites decreased and more of a consensus would start to show. It must be stressed that our methods were far from rigorous, and we all agree that being asked for just one “favourite cocktail” is an impossible choice, but here are the rest of the results of our surveys and research.
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Why the 13th of May?
The date was the first time that a newspaper printed the word “cock-tail” in reference to its modern meaning, in 1806, some 200+ years ago! A New York newspaper responded to a question from a reader about mixed drinks. No one is quite sure where the term cocktail comes from but in those days a “cock-tail” was a horse with a tail that stood upright like a cockerel’s, which leads us to believe that it was related to a mixed-breed horse. Thus a drink which is made by mixing, becomes a “cocktail”. A few other theories continue to do the rounds, and we’ve explained them all for you to choose your favourites.
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If you’d like to discover a new favourite cocktail, check out the TASTE cocktails monthly subscription for new ingredients and recipes delivered to your door.