Doctor Funk

The Doctor Funk is a Cocktail which consists of Dark Rum, Fresh Lemon Juice, Lime, Grenadine Syrup, Sodawater, and Pastis. A cocktail made popular by both Don the Beachcomber and Trader Vic, the Doctor Funk is based on a drink invented by the German-born Dr. Bernard Funk of Samoa. However, the original contained absinthe rather than rum, and also consisted of lime juice, soda water and grenadine, and perhaps juice of other available fruit.

Recipes

Trader Vic's Book of Food & Drink (1946)

• 2 1/2 oz dark Jamaican or Martinique rum
• 1/4 oz Pernod or Herbsaint
• 1 dash Angostura bitters
• Lemon soda

Mix first three ingredients in mixing glass with large pice of ice; pour over cracked ice in 10-oz glass, fill rest of glass with lemon soda

Trader Vic's Bartenders Guide (1972)

• 2 oz Dark Jamaica rum
• 1/2 oz lemon juice
• 1/2 Lime (squeezed into mixing glass?)
• 1 dash grenadine syrup
• 2 oz club soda
• 1 dash Pernod or Herbsaint

Put everything in a mixing glass with ice and stir, strain into a 14 oz chimney glass filled with (crushed?) ice. Float the Pernod and decorate with mint sprig and lime shell.

"Drinks of Hawaii," 2nd edition, by Paul B. Dick

• 1 1/2 oz Light rum
• 1/3 oz Pernod
• 1/4 oz Fresh lime juice
• 1/2 oz Grenadine
• 2 dashes Angostura bitters

Blend with crushed ice and serve in a pilsner glass or a tall 12 oz. glass. Garnish with a lime wheel, mint leaves and a cherry.

Bora Bora Cooler (Trader Vic's, circa early 1940s)

According to Trader Vic: "Dr. Funk of Tahiti made a drink like this, only he used some absinthe. I don't like the darn stuff so I think this is better"

• 2 1/2 oz Gold Rum (use Ron Merito)
• Juice of 1 Orange
• Juice of 1 Lemon
• 1/2 oz Curacao
• 1 tsp Sugar
• 2 dashes Grenadine

Mix first in a mixing glass with ice then pour into a 14-oz glass full of ice.

Quotes

From the book "White Shadows in the South Seas" (1919)

"'Dr. Funk,' a drink known to all the South Seas. Its secret is merely the mixing of a stiff drink of absinthe with lemonade or limeade."

From the book "Mystic Isles of the South Seas" (1921)

"I had been introduced to a Doctor Funk by Count Polonsky, who told me it was made of a portion of absinthe, a dash of grenadine,—a syrup of the pomegranate fruit,—the juice of two limes, and half a pint of siphon water. Dr. Funk of Samoa, who had been a physician to Robert Louis Stevenson, had left the receipt for the concoction when he was a guest of the club. One paid half a franc for it, and it would restore self-respect and interest in one's surroundings when even Tahiti rum failed."

External Links

• The Mysterious Doctor Funk - Eye of the Goof