A Mojito is five ingredients and the rum is the one most people get wrong. Mint, lime, sugar, and soda are loud; a neutral white rum disappears under them and you end up drinking limeade. The right rum has enough character to show through without turning the drink into a funk bomb, which is why Cuban-style white rum built the drink and why a few modern bottles make it better. Here's the recipe, the Cuban story, and the white rums in stock that actually hold up to the mint.
Shop all rum in stock at Chips Liquor
Where the Mojito Comes From
The Mojito is Cuban, descended from the Draque, a 16th-century mix of aguardiente, lime, sugar, and mint that sailors drank as medicine. When cleaner column-still rum arrived in Cuba in the 1800s, the aguardiente got swapped out and the drink became the Mojito. It spread through Havana's bars in the early 20th century, La Bodeguita del Medio made it famous (the Hemingway line on the wall is disputed, the drink isn't), and it became the one rum cocktail everyone in the world knows. The rum that defined it was light, dry, charcoal-filtered Cuban white, and that profile is still the baseline.
The Recipe
- 2 oz white rum
- 1 oz fresh lime juice
- 3/4 oz simple syrup (or 2 teaspoons sugar)
- 8 to 10 mint leaves
- Soda water to top
Put the mint and syrup in the glass and press gently with a muddler, just enough to bruise the leaves. Don't shred them; torn mint turns bitter. Add the lime and rum, fill with ice (crushed is traditional), stir, top with soda, and garnish with a slapped mint sprig. If you use sugar instead of syrup, muddle it with the lime first so it dissolves.
The Best Rums for a Mojito
Havana Club Añejo Blanco (the classic)
The closest thing to the original you can buy in the US. The Arechabala family created Havana Club in Cuba in 1934; after the revolution the recipe went to Bacardí, who make this version in Puerto Rico. It's column rum aged in ex-bourbon oak and charcoal-filtered clear, 40% ABV, and in a blind comparison Inu A Kena had it edge out the Cuban original. Dry, clean, a touch of vanilla, under $20. If you want the Mojito as Havana makes it, start here.
Flor de Caña 4 Year
A light gold rather than a white, and the dryest rum on this list. Four years in ex-bourbon oak, no added sugar, from the fifth-generation Nicaraguan distillery. The dryness is the point: it keeps the drink from going sweet, and the light oak adds a little weight against the mint. The best Mojito rum under $25.
Denizen Aged White
The bartender's white rum: three-year-old Trinidad column rum blended with a trace of Jamaican pot still for funk, charcoal-filtered, 40% ABV, and 95 points from Tastings.com at a bar-well price. It makes a Mojito that tastes like rum, with lychee and coconut notes that play well with lime. The house white for a serious home bar.
Planteray 3 Stars
A three-island blend (Barbados, Trinidad, Jamaica) with a hint of funk and a bit more proof at 41.2%. Pineapple and banana under the cane. Slightly fruitier than Denizen, equally dependable, and the one to buy if you're also making Daiquiris.
Foursquare Probitas
Foursquare's Barbados pot-and-column rum blended with Hampden's Jamaican pot still, unaged, unfiltered, no sugar, 47% ABV. This makes a Mojito with real texture and tropical funk that stands up to the mint instead of hiding behind it. For drinkers who find the classic version thin. The best Mojito on this list, if not the most traditional.
Diplomático Planas
Venezuelan rum aged up to six years and then filtered clear, bottled at 47%. Rounder and sweeter than the Cuban style, with cooked banana and vanilla from the pot-still component. Not a dry rum, so go easier on the syrup. For people who like a softer, richer Mojito.
Clément Canne Bleue (the agricole version)
Fresh cane-juice rhum from a single blue cane variety grown at Habitation Clément in Martinique, 50% ABV, bone dry and grassy with green mango and white pepper. An agricole Mojito is a different drink: the cane and the mint are both green, and they meet in the middle. Use a little less rum. The one for people who've had a hundred Mojitos and want a new one.
Wray & Nephew White Overproof (the Jamaican version)
Jamaica's best-selling rum at 63% ABV, all overripe banana and pineapple funk. Use 1 to 1.5 oz instead of 2, and the drink becomes a Jamaican Mojito with real bite. Off-recipe, cheap, and a lot of people's favorite once they try it.
Which to Pick
- The classic: Havana Club Añejo Blanco.
- Driest: Flor de Caña 4.
- Best overall: Probitas.
- Best value: Denizen Aged White.
- Richer: Diplomático Planas.
- Something new: Clément Canne Bleue.
Shipping From Chips Liquor
Every bottle above is in stock at our Pacific Beach shop in San Diego and ships fast to most states. For the Daiquiri side of the same bottles, read our Daiquiri rum guide, or see our guides to Foursquare and Planteray.