Welcome to our column where we look at what’s good to drink around Shanghai. And because it’s Friday. Whatever, we just want some booze. This week: the Jail Bird.

Are you going to prison? Does a stint in the slammer awaits? Then have this drink called the Jail Bird, a four-person rum cocktail served in a hollowed-out pineapple. It’s bright, it’s refreshing, and it won’t leave a poor taste in your mouth, unlike the lede of this article.

Before the Jail Bird started serving time, it was a cocktail called the Jungle Bird. Invented at the Kuala Lumpur Hilton during the 1970s, the Jungle Bird is one of the few classic tiki drinks that has only five ingredients: blackstrap rum, Campari, lime, pineapple, and simple syrup (Zombie, another popular tiki cocktail, has nine components).

But the Jungle Bird’s descent into crime happened when Australian bartender and spirits importer Laura Thomason was creating a drink for a tropical-vibe, rockabilly and rum event in Shanghai called, er, Rock N Rum. The Jungle Bird deviously turned it into a punch big enough to feed four, and swapped the dark rum for a white style from Australian producer The Grove Distillery.

Laura Thomason

“We’re letting the drink feel lighter and brighter on the palate,” Thomason said. “This is especially important when making punch drinks as you never know if it’s being shared between four to six people, or two people who are feeling like a party and going halves.”

What you get is a cocktail that doesn’t discriminate. “It’s sweet from the pineapple, fresh and bright from the rum, with enough Campari in it to bring around any seasoned Negroni drinker,” Thomason said. “And at the end of the day, who doesn’t want to drink straight from a pineapple?”

Try the Jail Bird (¥250) at The Hoy Hoy bar’s Rock N Rum event on Friday, May 25. While the party is one-off, the cocktail will make its rounds at certain Grove Distillery events in Shanghai.

The Hoy Hoy

64 North Maoming Road / 茂名北路64号

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