The Zombie recipe
for your table
Put all the ingredients with crushed ice in a blender or shaker.
Mix or shake briefly but vigorously.
Pour into a tall tiki glass and top up with crushed ice.
Garnish with mint and, optionally, a flammable lime wedge with overproof rum for a little fireworks.
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The story
Donn Beach, born Ernest Gantt, world traveler, bootlegger, and founder of the first tiki bar, created the Zombie in Hollywood in 1934. A customer with a hangover asked for something “to help him get back on his feet”; afterward, he said he had felt like a zombie for three days. Beach guarded his recipes obsessively and coded his bottles, so the original was not reconstructed until 2005 by tiki historian Jeff Berry. At the 1939 World's Fair in New York, the Zombie made him definitively famous.
The right glass
You don't serve a cocktail called Zombie in an ordinary highball glass. A tall tiki glass with Polynesian relief, or even better, a 70 cl skull glass, completes the presentation. The large capacity serves a purpose: it's filled with a mountain of crushed ice that keeps the strong mix drinkable. Our tiki category is full of characterful mugs that complete the scene. Prefer a tall glass in which the crushed ice remains visible? Take a look at our hurricane glasses.
Skull Tiki Glass 70 cl
Maori Tiki Mug 33 cl
Together € 48,90.
The right tools
For a Zombie, in addition to the glass, you use a Boston shaker, a jigger for precise measuring, a cocktail strainer, a fine strainer for double straining and a bitters bottle. These are the bar tools we use ourselves; you can find everything in our bar tools & cocktail sets.
Glass set (our choice 01) + 5 bar tools together € 96,70.
What do you use to make a Zombie?
For a Zombie, you need the right base. Well-known bottles include Stroh and The Kraken. On each liquor page, you can read the alcohol percentage, what it tastes like, which cocktails it works well in and which glass you need.
Variations & twists
The original recipe from 1934 contains nine ingredients, with two per person as the rule of thumb. That was carefully considered. Make a lighter version with two rums and no overproof float. The flaming lime boat with rum is spectacular: use it safely, away from straws and napkins. Looking for more inspiration? Browse more than 100 cocktail recipes.
Serving tip
Follow Donn Beach's house rule: no more than two per person. Falernum, a clove-forward liqueur syrup from Barbados, is essential to the authentic flavor and readily available online.
Good to know
How strong it is and why two is enough
There are 9 cl of rum in this glass, divided into 3 cl white, 3 cl golden, and 3 cl dark rum, whereas most cocktails make do with 4 to 6 cl. At 40% ABV, that amounts to 3.6 cl of pure alcohol, or almost three standard drinks in a single beverage. Diluted with crushed ice to around 25 cl, it still comes to roughly 15% ABV. Donn Beach set a limit of two per guest for good reason, and almost a century later, that remains a sensible house rule.
Falernum: buy it, replace it, or make it yourself
Falernum is a syrup or liqueur from Barbados with lime, cloves, ginger, and almond, and gives the Zombie its spicy base. The best-known bottle is 11% ABV and costs around twenty euros; at 1.5 cl per cocktail, 70 cl makes well over forty glasses. You can also make it yourself: steep lime zest, ten cloves, and fresh ginger overnight in 25 cl of white rum, strain, and mix with an equal amount of sugar syrup and a splash of almond syrup. In an emergency, sugar syrup, almond syrup, and a pinch of cloves will get you close.
Zombie or Mai Tai: the difference
Both are tiki classics made with multiple rums, but they are worlds apart. The Mai Tai has five ingredients and revolves around 6 cl of rum, lime juice, and almond syrup; it is a crisp, almost sour-like cocktail in which you can really taste the rum. The Zombie stacks nine ingredients and 9 cl of rum, with falernum, passion fruit, pineapple, and grenadine, making it more complex, sweeter, and considerably stronger. If you want to taste the rum itself, choose the Mai Tai; if you are looking for spectacle and a story, go for the Zombie.
The flaming lime boat, done safely
The fireworks come from a squeezed-out half lime shell placed upside down on the cocktail, filled with a teaspoon of 75% overproof rum and lit. Only do this at the table, away from straws, napkins, and hair, and keep the rum bottle closed and at least one metre away. The little flame burns for about a minute and then goes out on its own. Have a saucer ready to smother it, and let guests drink only once the flame is out and the shell has been removed from the glass.
Zombie cocktail with Bacardi rum
Anyone wanting to make a Bacardi Zombie can get all three rums from one house: Carta Blanca for the white, Carta Oro for the gold and Carta Negra for the dark. This works perfectly well and keeps things accessible, since the proportions remain three times 3 cl. If you want more depth, it is worth mixing instead: a Jamaican dark rum brings more ripe banana and molasses than a mild dark rum, and that is precisely the layer this Zombie cocktail rests on.
Where the Zombie cocktail recipe goes wrong
The Zombie cocktail recipe looks complicated, but mainly three things go wrong. Blending for too long is the first: the crushed ice melts away, making the Zombie cocktail watery, so blend for no more than a few seconds. The second is bottled lime juice, which tastes flat and bitter alongside the other eight ingredients. The third is the grenadine, of which there should really be no more than that one bar spoon; otherwise its sweetness overpowers the falernum and bitters. Therefore, measure everything with a jigger and arrange the bottles in order beforehand.
Frequently asked questions
What is in a Zombie?
A Zombie contains three types of rum: 3 cl white, 3 cl gold and 3 cl dark, with 2 cl lime juice, 1.5 cl falernum, 3 cl pineapple juice, 1.5 cl passion fruit purée, a bar spoon of grenadine and a dash of Angostura bitters. Nine ingredients, blended or shaken with crushed ice.
What is the strongest cocktail in the world?
The Zombie is considered one of the strongest classics: it contains 9 cl of rum in one glass, while most cocktails use 4 to 6 cl. Its inventor, Donn Beach, therefore introduced a house rule of no more than two per guest. The Long Island Iced Tea is a well-known competitor.
What can you use instead of falernum?
Falernum is a clove-flavored liqueur syrup from Barbados and is readily available online; it is difficult to replace without losing flavor. If you cannot get a bottle, approximate it with sugar syrup, a splash of almond syrup, some lime zest and a pinch of clove.
Which glass do you use for a Zombie?
A tall tiki glass with Polynesian relief or a 70 cl skull glass. That large capacity is functional: it holds a mountain of crushed ice that keeps this strong mix drinkable and cold. An ordinary highball glass does the presentation a disservice, see our tiki glasses for horeca-quality sets.
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