Name: Mary Pickford Cocktail
Total time: 3 min
Cuisine: Cocktail
Ingredients: 60 ml Light gold rum 1-3yo; 45 ml Pineapple juice; 5 ml Maraschino liqueur; 5 ml Grenadine syrup

Mary Pickford Cocktail
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Photographed in an UB Coley Coupe Gold 6oz

Ingredients:
2 oz	Light gold rum (1-3 year old molasses column)
1 ¹⁄₂ oz	Pineapple juice
¹⁄₆ oz	Luxardo Maraschino liqueur
¹⁄₆ oz	Monin Grenadine Syrup

Read about cocktail measures and measuring

How to make:

Select and pre-chill a Coupe glass.
Prepare garnish of Luxardo Maraschino Cherry.
SHAKE all ingredients with ice.
FINE STRAIN into chilled glass.
Garnish with maraschino cherry.

Strength & taste guide:

No alcohol

Medium

Boozy

Sweet

Medium

Dry/sour

More cocktails with similar strength and taste profile

Mary Pickford Cocktail lifestyle thumbnail

Today!

Cocktail of the day:

20th April 2025 is Anniversary of the 1st film star's movie debut

Review:

When made correctly, this pale-pink cocktail has a perfect balance between the fruit flavours and the spirit of the rum.

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History:

Created in the 1920s (during Prohibition) by Fred Kaufman at the Hotel Nacional de Cuba, for the silent movie star and wife of Douglas Fairbanks. Mary was in Cuba filming a movie with her husband and his best friend, Charlie Chaplin. This is recounted on page 40 of Basil Woon's 1928 book When It's Cocktail Time in Cuba, "The Mary Pickford, invented during a visit to Havana of the screen favourite by Fred Kaufman, is two-thirds pineapple-juice and one-third Bacardi, with a dash of grenadine. Both cocktails [The Presidenté is also mentioned] are sweetish and should be well shaken. The pineapple juice must be fresh-squeezed." Thus, it would appear that the dash of maraschino liqueur, now viewed as an essential ingredient, is a later addition to the Mary Pickford.

Nutrition:

One serving of Mary Pickford Cocktail contains 180 calories

Alcohol content:

1.3 standard drinks
16.37% alc./vol. (16.37° proof)
18.8 grams of pure alcohol

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Difford’s Guide remains free-to-use thanks to the support of the brands in green above. Values stated for alcohol and calorie content, and number of drinks an ingredient makes should be considered approximate.

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Showing 10 of 11 comments for Mary Pickford Cocktail.
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Marek Vranka

2nd December 2024 at 20:54

made it for my wife based on the original ratio from Woon's book; 60 ml pineapple to 30 ml rum, with tsp marchino and grenadine each, and it turned out wonderfully!

Albert Markiewicz

5th October 2024 at 22:22

I used freshly squeezed pineapple juice of a quite ripe pineapple and the cocktail came out much sweeter than I expected. 1/3 shot of the lime juice made it perfect though

Joel Tunnah

9th May 2024 at 01:30

I normally tinker with recipes to suit my tastes, but this was perfect as is. Wonderful fresh flavour and beautiful pink color (using Rose's Grendine syrup).

Peter McCarthy

25th April 2024 at 02:41

Made this with SelvaRey White Rum & Luxardo Maraschino. Very nice. Pineapple is subtle and maraschino adds some spice/interest/complexity while still letting the rum come through. Grenadine is basically just for color. Curious to try this with different rums...

Giles Alexander

4th March 2024 at 21:19

A delicious favourite. I prefer it with an aged rum, eg. 7yo Havana Club is great: it’s more mellow and forgiving of ratios.

John Hinojos

27th January 2024 at 05:18

Wonderful. Love the prohibition era cocktails of Cuba. They are different from the Tiki cocktails of the 1950s and 1960s. Tropical, but a bit different. Very well balanced.

Elijah Clark-Ginsberg

2nd December 2023 at 21:23

Hard to be mad at rum and pineapple, but I was definitely missing a bit of lime juice or something for a touch more acidity. I also certainly didn't get a pink color—pale or otherwise.

C.A. Mat

26th April 2023 at 02:05

Rum-forward in a good way. It's got a lot in common with a tiki drink but without the sour element to disguise the richness of the rum. I agree that the choice of rum matters here. I used a less-sweet-than-usual homemade grenadine and still found it quite sweet.

Chris Dimal

9th December 2022 at 18:37

Was disappointed. First of all, no colour change was observed (was yellow). Secondly, I just think I'm not a fan of Maraschino and what it did. I used homemade grenadine, but it normally gives off a satisfying pink. Any potential reason why it didn't work?

Simon Difford

3rd February 2023 at 18:53

Homemade grenadine lacks the added colouring of commercial grenadines so always produces a much paler cocktail. While the colour may disappoint, the flavour of grenadine made with freshly pressed pomegranate is hard to beat.

G. M. Genovese

15th February 2022 at 16:41

Would've never thought the choice of rum mattered so much here. First made it with Bacardi Carta Blanca. Ok, but not quite right. Next tried it with Barcelo Gran Anejo. Better, but still not quite ideal. Huh... Damn, I guess I have to play with this. (15 Feb 2022, 11:40a)

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