Coquito is a great liqueur to sip on when celebrating the coming of a new year, on warm summer evenings or a get together with friends.
We usually make this Christmas Liqueur at the holidays, it’s delicious and easy to prepare. Sometimes, however, change is good and coquito is a great choice whether you’ve had enough of eggnog or just want to try something new. This is also a liqueur and with exotic vibe – it tastes and smells like coconut and white rum and even though it’s served cold, I guarantee it will warm you up. And at the end I will as also a child-friendly version of the recipe.
Table of Contents
What is coquito?
Coquito is a holiday drink from Puerto Rico, the name literally means “little coconut”. I’ve heard it being called the puertorican eggnog which I consider wrong because there’s no egg in coquito. The eggs came later as an outside influence and the original recipes I know don’t use egg. It’s a pity that I don’t have a Caribbean abuela that would pass on to me her traditional recipe but I’ve tried it several times and found out the ingredients are luckily accessible in many parts of the world.
How to serve coquito
Coquito is served cold, even with ice if you want, and in a small glass. It’s sweet and you’ll get dizzy before you know it. However, drinking just one glass isn’t easy for me 😉
Ingredients
- 500 g of coconut cream
- 200 g sweetened condensed milk – here’s a recipe if you want to make it at home
- 200 g unsweetened condensed milk (also called evaporated milk)
- 200 ml of white rum
- half a tsp of ground cinnamon and some sticks for garnish
- seeds from 1 vanilla pod
- pinch of nutmeg
There are some ingredients missing in the photos. Make sure you use coconut cream, not just milk. The cream will make the liqueur nicely dense. If you don’t have unsweetened condensed milk, I’d say it’s ok because the sweetened one is more important and you can just use more coconut cream or – and here yes – coconut milk. Vanilla is important but if I don’t have a vanilla pod, I use extract. As for the white rum, I think it’s like the wine in sangría – it doesn’t need to be the best quality. So just use any you like.
Actually, you can adjust the ratio of the ingredients in any way you like. If you want your coquito to be stronger, add more rum but remember that the longer the drink rests, the stronger is gets. And you can store it months in the fridge. If you see a layer of fat form on the top, it’s just the coconut fat separating from the rest of cream. You can poke it with a chopstick and mix or let the drink stand at room temperature and then shake.
Recipe
Pour all liquid ingredients in a bowl and mix well. Then add the dry ingredients and mix again. Let the drink get cool in the fridge, pour in glasses, garnish with cinnamon sticks and serve. That is all!
Coquito for children
If you want the kids to enjoy the coquito, obviously you’ll have to skip the rum. Instead, add some rum aroma and you can also use coconut milk or more unsweetened condensed milk to make for the amount of white rum that you don’t use.
