The Piña Colada DNA: Coconut Cream

A university professor created the wildly successful Coco López we still know today.

Previous articles in this series: “The Piña Colada’s History”; “The Pineapple”

Another of the elements used in the Piña Colada by “Monchito” Marrero when he was commissioned to make a cocktail that represented the flavors of Puerto Rico was coconut cream.

Coconut cream had long been an important ingredient in many Puerto Rican dishes; however, extracting it is a laborious process because the sweet, white coconut meat is protected by a rock-hard, shell-like rind, and it has to be broken at just the right moment to obtain the peak flavor. 

But a chemist from University of Puerto Rico at Mayagüez campus created coconut cream called Coco López, changing sweet coconut cream consumption and production not only in the archipelago but abroad as well. Even today, when you look for coconut cream, Coco López is one of the few brands available.