Rhapsody in blue: Are blue cocktails on their way back?

Chan's winning Giffard West Cup Malaysia blue cocktail is called the Fisherman's Blue, and is proof that blue drinks can be elegant and sophisticated as well. Photo: The Star/Michael Cheang

The first time I heard of a blue coloured cocktail was in the 1988 movie Cocktail, in which Tom Cruise plays a bartender who makes a drink called Turquoise Blue for a patron at his bar. To be frank, the thought of blue drinks has never really appealed to me personally, but when I found out that the recent Giffard West Cup 2019 (Asia Pacific region) had a challenge that required bartenders to come up with a blue-coloured drink, I decided to explore the subject further.

A quick Internet search revealed that many of the more classic blue-coloured drinks tend to be tropical-themed tiki drinks, with the most famous being the Blue Hawaii, made with pineapple juice, blue Curaçao liqueur, coconut cream, and rum or vodka (or sometimes both).