Caipirinha

Make sure you are using cane sugar and not beet sugar in a Caipirinha. You can opt for white or Demerara, it’s down to your personal preference.

Some people use simple syrup, which you are more than welcome to do, but the “default” way of building the drink is with granulated sugar. 

Caipirinhas can be made with either limes or lemons, the former being the most widely used for the drink. Limes are tarter and sharper than lemons, and lemons in turn are a bit sweeter and have a stronger aroma.

As you’ll see in the Related Cocktails, Brazilians use other fruit beyond just limes and lemons in their Caipirinhas, so feel free to experiment to find what you like best!

The name Caipirinha is the diminutive of the Brazilian Portuguese word caipira which refers to someone from the countryside (more specifically, to someone from south-central Brazil). It’s equivalent to hillbilly in the US. 

As with other cocktails that are composed of a spirit, sugar and lime, the Caipirinha’s history isn’t cut and dry. This combination of ingredients was drunk in America for at least 500 years, if not more. It is possible that this cocktail evolved from a similar drink that used aguardiente as the main spirit.

Another story tells that the Caipirinha evolved from a medicinal drink used to fight off the Spanish Flu, which contained garlic, honey, limes and aguardiente. Eventually, sugar was added and the garlic and honey were dropped. 

Since Cachaça is so cheap in Brazil, there are some regions that prefer using vodka instead of it to create a more sophisticated drink. See Caipiroska in Related Cocktails.