May 5, 2025

Archive: Why El Diablo Is This History Nerd's Cinco de Mayo Cocktail of Choice

I love a Margarita, but this cocktail is more rooted in the spirit of this day in Mexican history.

Note: this post originally ran on Schustack.

El Diablo is a Buck variation made with tequila, crème de cassis, lime and ginger beer, and I think it’s a more historically symbolic cocktail to drink on Cinco de Mayo than a Margarita. Here’s why.

If you grasp what the 5th of May represents in Mexico, then you can appreciate that it’s a bit bizarre that Cinco de Mayo has become such a popular drinking holiday in America. Over the years, and especially in the past ten or so, it’s been hyped as though it’s Mexican St. Patrick’s Day—an excuse to binge tacos and get wasted on tequila, mezcal, (or other Mexican spirits), and Mexican beer. It shouldn’t be. 

In most of Mexico, no es gran cosa. It’s not that country’s Independence Day, as many misunderstand it to be (that’s the 16th of September). It’s the anniversary of an improbable underdog victory against the French army at the Battle of Puebla in 1862. It’s a win that was as short-lived as it was surprising. 

In a nutshell, Mexico was in serious debt to France, who had assisted with Mexico’s fight for independence from Spain in the 1810s to 1820s. Decades later, in serious debt to France with with no repayment plan in place, Napoleon III planned a Mexico invasion in 1862. The French troops attempted a surprise attack from the sea, led by Archduke Ferdinand Maximilian. But by the time they landed on the Mexican coast, General Ignacio Zaragoza Seguín had gotten wind of the impending incursion and prepared his army, though it was significantly smaller than the French one. 

On May 5, at the Battle of Puebla, an estimated 4,500 Mexican soldiers managed to overpower about 6,500 French ones. The French backed off and Mexico rejoiced in a brief period of calm and unity. 

Eventually Napoleon bore down with more troops and the dictator Maximilian was installed as Emperor of Mexico in 1864. At the time, the U.S. and France weren’t getting along either. No longer occupied with the Civil War, the U.S. sent military reinforcements to Mexico to expel the French, and Maximillian was executed by firing squad in 1867. 

I’m not such a purist that I don’t think it’s worth celebrating Mexico’s brief triumph against the odds with toast! Over the years, as a nod to the Battle of Puebla, and also the centuries of peace between the countries into the 21st century in its aftermath, it’s been my own tradition to celebrate Cinco de Mayo by making cocktails with Mexican spirits using small measures of French ingredients.

For this reason, I think El Diablo should be the quintessential Cinco de Mayo cocktail. Not only is it symbolically perfect, but I love the spring-like combination of flavors—the vegetal-earthy-citrus bite of good tequila, the tingle of spicy ginger beer (that’s the “diablo’ part), the bright berry notes of the cassis, which also lends a fetching plum-colored hue (and my favorite spring flowers are the purple ones, like lilacs). 

According to Jeff “Beachbum” Berry’s entry in The Oxford Companion To Spirits & Cocktails, the basic recipe dates at least as far back as 1940, when a drink called “Diablo” was published in the cocktail book The How and When by Gale Hyman. It initially called for rum as the base spirit, but by 1947 with the publication of the Bartender’s Guide, Victor “Trader Vic” Bergeron swapped it for tequila in the “Mexican El Diablo”. The 1972 edition shortens the name to “El Diablo”, which has since been the default. 

It’s an easy enough cocktail to prepare, but some establishments take it to the next level. At Sunken Harbor Club here in downtown Brooklyn, the drink is ceremoniously served in a large goblet tableside (or barside). The house lights are briefly cut off and on as a dramatic flash of flames is ignited and the bar staff trumpets in unison “EL DIABLO!!!” It never gets old. 

Here’s a recipe. Feel free to (responsibly!) add your own pyrotechnics. 

El Diablo 

1.5 oz/44 ml 100% agave additive-free tequila blanco or reposado

.5 oz/15 ml crème de cassis (French black currant liqueur) 

.5 oz /15 ml fresh lime juice

ginger beer (preferably a spicy one), to top

Garnish: lime wheel or twist, and/or candied ginger 

Combine all ingredients except the ginger beer in a cocktail tin with ice and shake until well-chilled and frothy. Strain into a highball glass, a double rocks glass, or goblet filled with fresh ice. Top with ginger beer. Garnish.