IRISH GIRL DRINKS ZOMBIE TIKI COCKTAIL FOR THE FIRST TIME | Cocktails with Ciara 

I don't remember ever having this drink. Sidenote: Grenadine is easy to make (if you use pomegranate juice rather than a whole pomegranate), and homemade is much tastier than store bought.

Ciara drinking any alcohol: not a flinch. Ciara tasting the left over grenadine: eeck aack, contorted faces.

This girl needs an agent and a movie career, she's absolutely stunning and loaded with personality. Any takers?

Back in the 80's I was at a wedding reception with an open bar. A good friend of mine drank 7 of them. Fortunately he had a designated driver. I will also add that he stands 6' 7" and weighed in around 275 lbs.

Hey Ciara! You’ll probably get loads of these comments but this recipe is missing some of Don’s signature ingredients. The original would have contained a secret ingredient called Don’s mix(really just White Grapefruit juice mixed with Cinnamon Syrup), a few drops of Absinthe, and of course the 151 rum you talked about in the video. As you can imagine it is an extremely potent drink having both Absinthe AND 151 rum(use a Demerara 151). If you can research the Beachbum Berry Zombie.(He is the one accredited with figuring out the original formula)

I remember Zombies, oh yeah, easy way to get to the "Why is it morning and how do I feel like this" part of the weekend

I was going to suggest the zombie after watching the hurricane. Fruity rum drinks always seem to hide their alcohol. Glad you enjoyed it.

also if you do not like store bought grenadine, you can make your own, by making a syrup out of pomegranate juice and sugar. easy to make and way better than any store bought garbage.

A couple of famous cocktails made with Scotch - - the Rob Roy and the Rusty Nail.

Yay zombies. Drunk from the legs up 😂😅🤣 I had three and fell off my barstool backwards 🤪😖

Drinking more than 2 of these definitely will turn you into a stumbling, mindless zombie.

Those things are lethal. Weird stories that you can't remember are a major result.

A long time ago, I was in Mainz at a club with some friends, and one guy stopped counting his zombies at eight, did not see him again until late afternoon the next day.

most recipes call for light and dark rum and 151. The 151 is usually floated on top. When I bar tended at Trader Vic's in Los Angeles, (a rival of Don the Beachcomber's). We added a teaspoon of cinnamon syrup and a dash or two of Angostura Bitters. We would add the light rum to the mix and then blend/shake pour into glass. Then pour the dark rum on top, quick stir and then float 151 on top.

Having 3 "1934 Zombies" at Don the Beachcomber in Seal Beach (now closed 😫) made for a very interesting day...

I'm sure that the guy who is the reason why the "2 Zombie maximum" had to be told the wild stories. Pretty sure he couldn't remember them... 😂

Zero bar experience but 100% more appealing than most bartenders. Always fun to watch!

Will you try making a caipirinha? They're so good and fairly easy to make.

5:08 I had to pause the vid to laugh, that's exactly the sound and face I make with grenadine. It's very much like the cough syrup we used to get back in the 80's.

I am glad to see Gosling dark rum It’s sooooo smooth

I want you on my team in a Zombie APOCALYPSE

Will you try to make "The Last Word"? It is absolutely perfect!

love the bangs!!!

Hey!! Love from the Detroit city! Nice video. Making the Irish proud. 👍😀😜

Ciara. This was great. the zombie is an excellent cocktail. I can't wait to see you reaction when you get all of the ingredients.

"The Zombie's beautifully fruity flavor is deceptive and hides a serious amount of alcohol." Yup. The Zombie was the drink that gave me my first REALLY bad drunk/hungover experience. It was in September of 2010, I was 22 and in college, living away from home for the first time. My roommates and I were celebrating a friend's birthday (and I had just gotten my heart broken romantically that night), so I slammed back several Zombies not being told how potent they were. The next thing I remember, I was trying to stand up from lying on the couch, but I had wobbly "pony" legs, so my roommates had to help me to the bathroom. I spent the night puking my insides out and woke up the next morning with a throbbing head and feeling like I'd ridden a roller coaster. And I had to go to my first day of classes that day. I called my mom and was like, "I'm hung over. Help! What do I do?" "Go to class," she answered. "No, Mom, I mean, the room is still spinning and I'm scared. What do I do?" She then gave me some remedy advice--water and greasy foods--but I couldn't follow it because my stomach was still swirling. After a horrible day, I arrived back home and made myself a bowl of Campbell's chicken noodle soup and it was the best thing I'd ever eaten. It wasn't until February of last year, just before the pandemic, that I was able to try a Zombie again without cringing at the thought. It was at a Mexican restaurant, hanging out with friends (gods, remember those days?), and I saw Zombies were on the menu. I offered to split one with a friend of mine and finally broke the bad memories the drink had had for me. Its sweetness perfectly complimented the spicy food we ate and now I can say I'd happily enjoy Zombies again--sparingly, of course! Cheers!

I do believe that the first time I have ever seen you make a face when tasting something was the grenadine on this video. And that's saying something because I've seen you taste a lot of wild things on the Try Channel. Love your videos, please keep them coming.

One of my favorite Tiki drinks! Cheers Ciara

With all the variations that came after the Donn Beach original, I can hardly say you are wrong to call this a zombie, but I think it's worth saying there is very litle resemblance to the original. I'd recommend picking up one of Beachbum Berry's books who rediscovered the original formulation, or Smuggler's Cove where it's also included. That should really help when you eventually re-evaluate this episode. Let's go over the similarities and differences between your recipe and the Donn Beach original anyway. The grenadine was exactly right, 1 teaspoon in the original as in yours. Pineapple juice is not in the original though. Instead the sweet component in the original is a combination of falernum and Donn's mix, itself a combination of equal parts white grapefruit juice and cinnamon syrup, cryptically designated as spices #4. The measures were 1/2 oz each, so about 15 ml, but for the Donn's mix you could just as well take 1/4 oz or 7.5 ml of cinnamon syrup and grapefruit juice. If you can't get your hands on white grapefruit, there's no shame in using red grapefruit. Falernum is a complex and variable syrup or liqueur which you can find many recipes for but John D. Taylor makes a good Velvet Falernum you can just buy as is. The amount of lime you used is quite a bit more than in the original, but then there is lime in the falernum and grapefruit in the Donn's mix so the sourness should be similar. In any case, the original calls for 3/4 oz or about 22.5-25 ml. On to rums. I have Smuggler's Cove to hand which uses its own classification. In any case it calls for three dark rums, one of which overproof, with the regular proof rums a 1 1/2 oz pour each, so 45-50ml, and the overproof rum a 1 oz pour, so 30 ml. The types it calls for are a blended aged rum, so a combination of pot an collumn still rums aged a minimum of 5 years, collumn still aged rum and black blended rum. Your Appleton Estate Signature Blend is a lightly aged category, so not exactly right but close. You could swing for the Reserve or Rare Casks to get the real deal, and of course many others from other distillers and other parts of the Carribean. The Appleton Special is definitely too light to fit the collumn still aged category, but it's probably got a lot of collumn still in the blend so is pretty close in that regard. There are a lot of good options in this category, Havana Club 7, Bacardi 8 and 10, and plenty of Angostura offerings starting with the 5 year. Finally as you rightly point out you really need an overproof rum and Gosling's Black Seal is not, but it is a black blended rum, and with a bigger pour it does account for the discrepancy in strength. Gosling's does also have a 151 overproof you could look for, otherwise Plantation O.F.T.D. is a good alternative, and of course Lemon Hart 151 is the ideal. Finally, the original zombie included 2 dashes of herbstura. This is a mixture of equal parts herbsaint and Angostura bitters, herbsaint itself being basically absinthe except without wormwood to get around the ban. I'd suggest keeping empty Angostura bitters bottles for this exact purpose, refilling one with absinthe, and adding a dash each of Angostura and absinthe to your Zombie. The serve of the original Zombie is in a special glass called a Zombie glass of course which is basically an extra tall Collins or high ball glass. The tiki mug you have is about the right ratio of width to depth, so it's alright. The garnish is just a mint sprig, unusually simple for a tiki drink, but this is a very early drink so things weren't all that complex visually yet. To add, the Jet Pilot is basically a simplified and rebalanced version of the Zombie. It forgoes the grenadine, uses 1/2 oz of each of the non-alcoholic ingredients of the original (splitting Donn's mix into its parts though) with 1 oz black blended rum and 3/4oz each blended aged and black blended overproof rum, finished with a dash of herbstura and served in an old fashioned glass without garnish. I think you'll love this one too.

as a rookie in the USN I ordered one or two of those in a Base Bar at Guantanamo Bay Cuba . They came with a cutsie pie skull shaped mugs that you got to keep. The only thing was you had to keep track of two glass mugs after getting drunk in the Rum capital of the world . not an easy task. I remember standing watch back on the ship and watching others return from a night out clutching the handles of two broken mugs. The things I remember from my drinking days. There were quite a few lost time and location episodes.

Zombies are my favourite cocktail. Got into them years ago and love them a lot. A very strong beverage for sure.

Many fond memories of Ciral's House Of Tiki on the South Side of Chicago. Ciral's zombie had seven shots of liquor 😮 and a strict 'one per customer' limit.

I made mine with a splash of passion fruit juice as well, which made it just a hint sweeter and more tropical

Great video and that blue is DEFINITELY your color! Just stunning!

Being in fl. There were alot of springs brake bars on the gulf. They made alot of the teka drinks and rum drinks using a southern comfort vs. I remember in the late 80's southern comfort brand had bar books and cook books using sc in the mixes. Some drinks they just added sc in to the drink as a extra and some times replaced one of the original items with sc. The thing that i remember most you normally replaced 1 oz of the other drink with 2-4 oz of sc.

I had one of these. Shortly after, I started seeing sounds. Great video as always Ciara. Love the bangs btw (frills) 🤣🤯. Cheers! 🥃🥂

The first time I ever had zombies, my favorite bartender kept topping the glass off with 151 proof rum. I drove home in 2nd gear because it was the only gear I could fine,

Whenever my wife and I went to a 'Polynesian' restaurant I always got a Zombie. Never more than 1 though. For the obvious reasons! I love this drink. Thanks for making one Ciara!

wahoo! fun times!

That's an awesome story ..! Try the "Suffering Bastard" It's a must try.

04:53 "don't open that closet, fibber mcgee!"

Greg at "How to Drink" has a video on making your own grenadine, which will probably get you away from the "cough syrup" flavor. "Behind the Bar" also reveals that 15 seconds is about all you need to shake for any drink.

always seems to taste different every place you get it but when they get it right their amazing

I'm glad you finally made a Zombie. I used to drink these in a bar I went to when I was 18. They made them in a half wine decanter and they had no limits thank god. Lol

The times I had a Zombie it came with an orange round laid on top and on that a sugar cube that had some 151 on it and the cube was on fire 🔥

Ok I also forgot to mention you MUST USE CRUSHED ICE when making Tiki Cocktails. Use crushed ice in the shaker while preparing and always use extra to top off in Tiki mug or glass.

In my local bar/club they do a Zombie but they add blue grenadine to give it that zombie green sort of look and I'm positive they use overproof white rum as one of the three. Definitely worth a revisist when you can get your hands on a bottle

The Zombie is definitely a sneaky drink. With the fruit juice and the grenadine helping hide the power of the rum. I've had one where it's made in a tiki bowl for 3-4 people and they only serve you one for the table for the night.

Great video! I love all of yours...I got hooked on Irish People Try and have followed ever since. I have a zombie drink called the Zombie Brain Punch...but basically the same thing with a couple of exceptions. 1/2 oz each of white, black and gold rum, 2 oz of pineapple juice, 1 oz of raspberry puree and 1/2 oz of simple syrup. That's it easy peasy. Best wishes from the home of all the great Bourbons.....Kentucky!

My god.. I found her channel! The favorite of the TRY channel and the queen of any drinking establishment from Ireland to the states (and probably the world!).

I never had one. Thanks for sharing. I will try it someday.

I had this drink to salute my grandmother from Long Lake NY who had it. I remember her saying that after she drank it, that she was crawling on the floor. Lol. When I took the challenge, I didn’t crawl on the floor but the next day I did crawl to the toilet like a zombie. Ironically, my grandmother is over 50 percent Irish heritage due to family names of Condren and Buryne, no one really knows when the first relative came off the boat from Ireland. Of course that didn’t help her alcohol resistant. Lol.

An excellent idea, to make a "boat drink" in winter to focus on a better, warmer climate. (Check out the Jimmy Buffet song of the same name)

I've had a version of the zombie cocktail with rum and absinthe and it was delicious!

Thanks for the video! I suggest trying the Jungle bird 🦜 as your next tiki drink! I love it!

Never tried the Zombie, but you make it sound wonderful.

Great job Ciara.

My go to tiki drink is a scorpion bowl. Also definitely an over proof rum drink

this drink and long islands are my drink of choice I always order them 2 at a time as they go down so smooth and fast. I love sweet drinks and totally despise bitter drinks

Good idea to put in cheap ingredients first. I'm going to remember that tip. Thanks!

I generally make my grenadine in small batches from pomegranate juice, as i have a similar opinion of the bottled stuff.

I was introduced to this cocktail in Jamaica. When they made it they made the cocktail the finished it by floating the overproof on top. This made it extremely aromatic!

Yay!

Maith thú for trying on this one. I'm a former mixologist and after some research I did I was satisfied that this was the closest original recipe (less popular perhaps because there's no pineapple or orange). But it's terrific! Any good dark rums should do.

Yes, three rums! A silver, a dark (I would use Myer's), and float a bit of Bacardi 151 on top. Old school would use a syrup such as Orgeat or Falernum but in my bartender days would use Amaretto for that distinctive almond flavor. And alcohol. Just to nitpick, tiki got big before and especially after the War with Hawaiian and Polynesian influences. So this was on the West Coast. Don's buddy Victor Jules Bergeron claimed the Mai-Tai and started Trader Vic's in the Bay Area with Don being in Hollywood.

Great episode. I haven’t tried a Zombie before but that might have to change-I’m so curious now despite the drink’s reputation. Also I love your outfit!

I always used white, gold and dark rum with same other ingredients as yours Clara, but float 151 ovenproof rum on top.

How can it be a Tiki drink without a little umbrella in the mix? There is nothing that hides the amount or strength of alcohol like sweet and citrus. Good idea on the three rums but one should be (as you noted) a 151 proof. Great job, Ciara!

If you’re looking for overproofed rum go for Plantation’s OFTD if you can get it. But I applaud your choice of Appleton Estate

I agree with you about the Grenadine. A little bit goes a long way.

Luxardo Cherries are the bomb!! Spoon that over ice cream

With you on the difficulty of getting the spirits you want... at least for a price that won't break the bank. There are some bottles where I'd be paying more for shipping than the bottle itself costs.

yummmm!

Just in time for the warmer months

Beverages aside, that dress compliments your eyes beautifully. Now back to beverages, i am enjoying the summer type of drinks as it is still quite chilly here where I live. 'Cheers!

When I was younger, my go-to cocktail was Purple Hooters. Sweet and sometimes deadly. You should try it.

You might try STROH Austrian rum. They have a 160 proof rum, based on beet sugar, rather than cane sugar. (makes the BEST rum and Cokes)

I recommend the prairie fire shot. Everclear and Tabasco.

I couldn't help but notice your dress matches the Tiki cocktail glass. 😁

Oooh oooh NAVY GROG!!

I remember drinking these in some asian resturant in Mass. I know i had 2. she wouldn't bring me more so I had my friend order 2 for me. i know i drank 3. don't remember the 4th or the beers. Had so much fun in Cape Cod!

Haven't had a zombie in decades. Aloha Inn served the best.

Never heard of this one before, sounds deliciously dangerous and I can’t wait to make it myself 🙃

You just have to make your own grenadine. It’s easy, honest. Also. Game changer. Cheers!

Lovely drink. Had more than two one night (and a couple of others) in an underground tikibar. I wish I remembered what happened and that my "friends" didn't.

What a gorgeous dress!

When travel is safe again you should come to Las vegas and try Frank's tiki lounge! Best drinks in the whole town. Plus there's an amazing pasty restaurant just up the street

Here is a drink known as a Wham-Bam that was local to the Dallas bar I used to bartend in. This bar, The Hungry Hunter, was owned by Mike Ditka then the defensive head coach for the Dallas Cowboys and later the head coach of the Chicago Bears. As many Cowboys came into the bar it was a massivly popular bar and this was a featured drink. It was served with a warning that it hit you twice thus the names Wham and Bam. Women loved it and it could be a deadly drink for them. I often limited them to only one as they usually had had a drink or two first and they needed to be able to walk out. Remember this is purely an alcohol drink without any mixers to dilute it. The ingredients are as follows: equal parts shaken over ice and served in a snifter Cognac (Courvoisier or other good cognac preferred) Vodka (any good brand) Orange Liqueur (Triple Sec preferred) Almond Liqueur (Amaretto Di Saronno) All are in 30 mL size shots the warm nuttiness of the cognac combines perfectly with the almond and orange liqueurs and the vodka keeps the punch up. It is somewhat sweet from the two liqueurs but the cognac and vodka balance it out. When younger I used to take a one gallon jug and pour in one entire bottle of each and then put the bottle into the freezer so there was always a very chilled drink available anytime. It never lasted long.

I can always appreciate a good and strong cocktail drink or a very tasty old fashioned with a good bourbon. So thank you, I for one ca always appreciate any suggestions on a full book of strong cocktails and high ball sippers if ever you come bye a few. I have 6 old cocktail recipient books but sadly there all from my grandparents after there passing. But there are some awsumly good old fashioned recipes I've never herd off and I've ben around the world twice.

Yay!!! Thank you for the ultimate kitsch tiki drink!! Well... Outside of a grasshopper... Ideas??

I’m not normally a fan of pineapple juice but it’s great in a Zombie. A similar tropical drink w pineapple juice - if you’re ever looking for something (like yourself) that’s fun & looks amazing but can lead to trouble - is Liquid Marijuana. It’s got spiced rum, coconut rum, melon liqueur, blue curaçao, sweet & sour, & pineapple juice. Not as strong as a Zombie, & a bit sweet, but it has a great electric green color.

Here is a thought, how about doing a blender party. That is two or three blenders assorted fruits 🍉🍎🍓🍍🫐🍌 with rums and lots of ice. Just make them up no recipes, just go for it. This has been some of my best parties 😋

I use a Hamilton Beach single spindle drink mixer and pebble ice rather than a shaker. The mixer gives it an airy consistency you can't really replicate with a mixer or blender.

I love Polynesian pop aka tiki and this is greatness for me lol

About 15 years ago I was mixing drinks at a party. I was mixing zombies using absinthe. I drank an entire pitcher myself. 45 minutes afterwards I was at the airport trying to steal an airplane. Haven't drank one since.

Good for you with the zombie. The tiki bar in Key West didn’t limit our zombies, but then again, you walk everywhere on that island.

A good summery one here in America is a bombpop. It is a popsicle that we turned into a drink. Lots of flavor and colorful. But you will need a tall glass. Cheers.

Well done. Your history, glassware, and fruit ingredients were spot on. The over-proof rum is only used as a floater. Besides the rums, there are other liqueurs in the original Zombie. An ex-bartender of Donn's tiki-bar did publish the recipe for the original zombie that Donn kept locked away. I have it, I will find it in my file cabinet, and send it to you via Instagram. Cheers!

The first time I ever had a zombie was, believe it or not, at California Adventure, a Disney park. It was definitely a kick in the face. 🙂

Make a "Death in the Afternoon". Ernest Hemmingways favorite. Cheers Ciara!