When I reached the tender age of seven, my mother began introducing me to the delights of "exotic" cuisine. At home, she would prepare foods that were slightly out-of-the-ordinary for the typical American family of the 1950's, including tacos, Welsh Rarebit, Hungarian Goulash, Irish Bubble and Squeak, along with a variety of Japanese and Chinese inspired dishes. My most exciting culinary experiences occurred when, every now and then, my mother would dress me up in a blue blazer, gray flannel slacks, and a silk tie and whisk me off to New York City to taste the cuisine of some of the best restaurants of the day. I now realize that her ulterior motive was to create a perfect little gentleman with a discriminating palate, since I was her only candidate within our family. My father and my brother were not happy unless they had red meat and potatoes on their plate.
Le Veau d'Or, 21 Club, La Fonda del Sol, Luchow's, and Senior Pico (San Francisco) were just a few of the fine establishments that served as the basis for my gastronomic education. Each one had a unique style of food and each had an equally original décor, the likes of which I had never seen in the "wilds" of New Jersey. Among the fine restaurants that I experienced, one stands out in my mind as having had a particularly exciting dining environment. It appeared to be a primeval tribal village that had been dropped in the middle of a tropical jungle; surrounded by palm trees, anchors, fish nets, high-backed rattan chairs, bamboo lamp spears, and antique wooden outriggers hanging from the ceiling. It was Trader Vic's. This magical Polynesian island décor was housed in a place that could not have been more incongruous with a tropical lifestyle - the lower level of the fabled Plaza Hotel - to this day, one of the world's most elegant lodgings. From early childhood, I was familiar with the Plaza because it served as the setting for the Eloise series of books that my mother would sometimes read as bedtime stories. But I was not prepared for the Plaza's strange subterranean world in which rum kegs, scorpion bowls, Samoan fog cutter vases, colorful depictions of half-naked Polynesian women, and hot buttered rum skulls conspired to create the impression that the diner was entering a forbidden land where intrigue lurked behind every tiki-ladened corner. Victor Bergeron (Trader Vic) explained the success of his themed restaurants in this way:
The first Trader Vic's restaurant in New York was housed in the beautiful Savoy-Plaza Hotel from 1958 until the hotel's untimely demolition in 1965. It was replaced by one of the mighty skyscrapers that would usher in the era of corporate America's extravagance and self-indulgence, The General Motors Building.Trader Vic's found a new home at The Plaza Hotel in 1965 and remained there until its closing during the reign of Donald Trump in 1989.
Trader Vic's at The Plaza Hotel was an institution in New York, frequented by tourists, but attracting a local crowd as well. I remember being frightened by the contorted faces carved into life-size wooden Tiki's (totem poles) standing guard under subdued light at the entrance, greeting diners as they entered Vic's pagan temple of pleasure. According to Polynesian lore,Tiki's ward off evil spirits, reassurance for those of us who frequent Polynesian restaurants. These same scowling faces adorned Trader Vic's Kava bowls, replicas of ceremonial earthen ware (filled with a potent spirit) used when entertaining special guests in the men's Long House on Tahiti and other Polynesian islands. For most of us, the Tiki face has come to be closely identified with the ubiquitous tall green glasses that are the hallmark of Polynesian restaurants. At Trader Vic's, they were filled to the brim with rum and garnished with a cherry and a slice of pineapple skewered on a colorful swizzle stick, bearing the head of the brown mythical creature known as a "Menehune" the South Pacific's answer to the mischievous Leprechan. The now famous Mai Tai, was just starting to take off, but would soon become the most popular Tiki cocktail of all time.
In order to give this drink its rightful place in history, the Trader Vic's organization celebrated the 60th anniversary of the Mai Tai last year. As the story goes, Victor Bergeron created the magical elixir back in 1944 at his first Trader Vic's restaurant in Oakland, California. Vic and his bartenders had just concocted a new rum-based libation that they had not yet tasted, when two of Vic's friends from Tahiti, Eastham (Ham) and Carrie Guild, arrived at the restaurant unexpectedly. Vic gave them a taste of the drink and Ham promptly proclaimed in the Tahitian dialect "Mai Tai roa ae", translated as "out of this world, the best." The name stuck. Recently, I made a pilgrimage to Trader Vic's Beverly Hills to learn more about the Mai Tai from Chai Rojana, general manager of this glitzy restaurant, one of the most beautifully designed of the "Trader" properties. Combining a lush tropical rainforest off the lower dining room, with a series of plush red leather banquettes, this far-away corner of The Beverly Hilton Hotel embodies the Trader Vic's lifestyle. Guests who are seated on the upper dais feel as though they are colonial plantation owners surveying their domain and they are treated like royalty by Mr. Rojana and his staff. Perhaps that is because Rojana received his training from the master himself, working at the original San Francisco flagship Trader Vic's for a number of years. He knows the secrets behind "Trader Vic's Original Mai Tai" and spoke openly about the drink and its original formulation. As times have changed and cocktails evolve, the recipe listed below is not the precise one in use today. Brands of rum and other ingredients have changed, but this is the original Mai Tai as created by Victor Bergeron and given to me by Hans Richter, President of Trader Vic's:
Shake well with shaved or crushed ice. Pour in 15 oz. double old fashioned
glasses. Garnish with sprig of mint and half of the spent lime shell.
(As the drink evolved, a Menehune spear skewered with a cherry and pineapple
came to be added to all Mai Tai's served at Trader Vic's).
Over the years, the Mai Tai has been closely linked to Trader Vic's, but there is some controversy about who actually developed the popular libation..In the book HAWAI' I, Tropical Rum Drinks & Cuisine, authors Arnold Bitner and Phoebe Beach claim that the Mai Tai was invented by Donn Beach, a.k.a." Don The Beachcomber", the brilliant innovative restaurateur who created his Polynesian Tiki bar, "Don's Beachcomber" just off Hollywood Boulevard in 1933.
Apparently arguments raged for years about the origin of the drink, including occasional face-to-face discussions between Victor Bergeron and Donn Beach. It is true that Vic was greatly influenced by "Don's Beachcomber" bar and freely admitted this in 1947 when he wrote the following tribute:
The only similarities between Vic and Don's Mai Tai is that they both contain rum. Here is Don's version:
when I recreated the above recipe and tasted it, I found it far too complicated and diffuse for my taste. There are simply too many competing flavors. The Trader Vic's Mai Tai is brilliant in its relative simplicity and balance, containing ingredients that blend seamlessly to create a most pleasurable drinking experience. The debate about the origin of the drink may continue, but one fact is undeniable. The Mai Tai that the American public has come to know and love, the version that is most imitated (but never duplicated) throughout the world today, is the one created by Victor Bergeron at Trader Vic's.
Over the years, Trader Vic's restaurant group expanded world-wide, spreading Polynesian/Chinese cuisine combined with American hospitality from Abu Dhabi to Atlanta. But it has been a while since a new restaurant has opened in the U.S. To my great surprise and delight, I happened to be in San Francisco in November of 2004 as the newest property opened, Trader Vic's at 555 Golden Gate Avenue (near Van Ness) one of the first Trader Vic's to open in the United States in many years. A contemporary, sophisticated, and stylized decor defines Trader Vic's San Francisco, a restaurant that should appeal to the new generation of young upscale cocktail drinkers, with its 20 foot long carved wooden bar, dramatic tall chrome and glass back bar display and a handsome carved wooden 32 foot outrigger purchased in Bali and suspended from the ceiling. When I returned in January of 2005, I learned more about the various incarnations of the Mai Tai from the young, knowledgeable, and attentive bartenders and waitstaff. When I asked for a "hand-made" old fashioned Mai Tai, I received what they call a "Mai Tai San Francisco". The recipe is a bit different from the Original Mai Tai in the use of Trader Vic's brand of Gold and Dark Rums.This is a delicious and well-constructed version of the cocktail, a more complex and more precisely delineated drink than the standard Mai Tai.
In this fickle ever-changing industry, where restaurants open and close at the blink of an eye, Trader Vic's must be held in high-esteem for being, quite possibly, the most enduring restaurant group in history. It has been 70 years since Victor J. Bergeron started the first Trader Vic's, disproving the old adage that "a good restaurant only lasts as long as its lease." Even though he is no longer with us, Bergeron family members and savvy executives who once worked with Vic, like Trader Vic's President Hans Richter, a 35 year veteran of the organization, Vice President of American and German Operations Sven Koch, and the charming Chai Rojana who worked at the original flagship Trader Vic's in San Francisco, are assuring that Vic's genius and his legacy continue. Expansion marches on in the United States, with Trader Vic's restaurants scheduled to open soon in Scottsdale, Las Vegas, and Bellevue, Washington.
