kaukau

You are sooo right!

We have done that ourselves, now that I think about it.

Mahalo!

gemac

Tell your friends to make up some of these mai tais, and have them just before going through security (recipe is for one drink):

1 oz. Okolehao (dark)
1 oz. Myer's Planter's Punch rum
1 oz. Orange Curacao (Hiram Walker)
1 oz. Lemon Juice
1 oz. Orgeat syrup

I guarantee you it will be better than anything they can have on any airline.

cblaisd

I learned something I didn't know last night while surfing on some of the marvelous Hawai`ian language and history resources that the Kamehameha Schools website has: MaiTai is a corruption of the Hawai`ian word maika`i

slippahs

For a moment there, I actually thought you went "surfing." I can't imagine you hanging 10 on some big waves.

PremEx

This is sort of a "What came first...the chicken or the egg" question. Or in this case, "Which came first...Tahitian or Hawaiian?"

Many Hawaiian words are derived from their original Tahitian counterparts where the letter "T" (which doesn't exist in the Hawaiian alphabet) is simply replaced by the letter "K"...like Tabu=Kapu ("B" also not existing in the Hawaiian alphabet) or Mai Tai=Mai Kai. Both mean basically the same thing, "Good."

According to Mai Tai history/legend...when Victor J. "Trader Vic" Bergeron first served this as-yet unnamed drink to some friends from Tahiti in 1944...they exclaimed in Tahitian, "Mai Tai - Roa Ae!" And that was it. It was never a really a "corruption" of Mai Kai. "Mai Kai" is more the other way around. And the drink was named from the outset for the Tahitian term.

As much as the Mai Tai is associated with being "the" Hawaiian drink by many, or somehow being a native Hawaiian drink...it was actually introduced by Trader Vic in Oakland California in 1944 (though friendly rival Don The Beachcomber down in Hollywood California had a very similar but more complex drink by a different name prior to Vic's creation) and was mostly first "marketed" as a Tahitian specialty to Vic's customers. It wasn't even brought to Hawaii until Vic was hired to introduce some tropical drinks to the Matson Steamship Lines' menus and their bar menus at their Moana, Surfrider, and Royal Hawaiian hotels...in 1953. From almost that moment, the Mai Tai became the favorite drink of Hawaii and became forever associated with the islands. In fact, the drink was so popular that the Royal Hawaiian Hotel quickly changed the name of their popular beach bar to "The Mai Tai Bar"...which it remains to this day.

With the explosion of the whole popular Hawaii/Tiki craze in the United States in the mid 1950's and which carried on into the 60's and 70's...a few rare drink menus adopted the Hawaiian version of the name..."Mai Kai" for their identical version of the Mai Tai. Sometimes however, ordering a "Mai Kai" got you a totally different tropical drink. It was basically up to the establishment. But the vast majority of bars stuck with "Mai Tai" for the name of this classic cocktail.

cblaisd

Very interesting stuff!

I *think* "Mai Kai" would literally mean something like "from the ocean," whereas "maika`i" means good, well, excellent iirc.

Maybe slippahs can weigh in too?

slippahs

Sounds like PremEx's story matches that of Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mai_Tai

PremEx

I don't know about "from the sea." But the use of Mai Kai is just a standard mainland adaptation of the Hawaiian language...skipping all the little ' ` s and such.

As slippahs' link to Wikipedia points out...this was even done with "Mai Tai"...as it has basically the same Trader Vic story but with this:

Maita'i=Maika`i

Mai Tai=Mai Kai

Hawaii=Hawai`i

All the same. Take two tais and call me in the morning.