Each year on July 19, people across the United States fill their glasses with a rum-based cocktail and celebrate National Daiquiri Day.

Daiquiri is actually a family of cocktails whose main ingredients are rum, citrus juice (typically lime) and sugar.

American mining engineer, Jennings Cox, who was in Cuba at the time of the Spanish-American War, is credited as being the inventor of the Daiquiri.

The original drink was served with one teaspoon of sugar sprinkled over ice, then the juice of two fresh limes was squeezed over the sugar, followed by 2-3 ounces of rum.

It was at a later date that the Daiquiri evolved into a shaved-ice drink, that was mixed in a shaker using the same ingredients.

This drink is also sometimes served frozen, combined and poured from a blender eliminating the need for manual pulverization.

Yet another way to create a frozen Daiquiri is by using frozen limeade, which provides the required texture, sweetness and sourness all at one time.

And should it ever come up during the course of a conversation, the Daiquiri was one of the favorite drinks of writer Ernest Hemingway and President John F. Kennedy.

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