Everyone loves a good cocktail, right? You mix together different ingredients to create a delicious drink. But sometimes you’ll need to be careful with exactly what you are putting in your drink. Keep reading to learn how to mix rum and vodka and enjoy our simple Rum and Vodka punch cocktail recipe below.

First, you want to ensure that it tastes good together. And secondly, it’s pretty important that it doesn’t leave you feeling super ill.

You’ll be happy to know, though, that you can mix vodka and rum together. In fact, there are tons of cocktails out there that use both vodka and rum as their chosen liquors. Absolute Stress and the Caribbean Painkiller are just two examples, but there are loads more too.

However, you will want to be wary of just how many of these vodka and rum cocktails you sip away at if you want to avoid any adverse effects – especially in the morning.

In this article, we’re going to learn all about vodka and rum including the common misconceptions, what causes adverse effects, and any external factors that may play a role in those hangovers we desperately want to avoid.

Over-Indulging Is The Main Culprit – Not Mixing

Don’t mix your alcohol is one of those drinking rules that we’ve heard time and time again. Drink mixing leads to a pretty hardcore vomit session, right? Well, not exactly.

There is some truth in it, of course, if you overindulge in a multitude of varying strong liquors you’ll definitely feel your stomach churning and will be overcome with a pounding head in the morning. But that’s if you go overboard.

But in all honesty, that is a given if you overindulge in any one liquor. Simply put, if you drink a lot of any alcoholic beverage, you’re going to be faced with a hangover the next morning.

If you have just one or two cocktails with mixed alcohol, you’re not going to feel sick and you’re not going to have a hangover. The misconception about mixing drinks comes from the fact that it can become quite difficult to track just how much alcohol you’ve consumed and thus can lead to overindulging more easily.

External Factors That Influence How You Handle Liquor

You know how some people are referred to as lightweights and some are known as heavier drinkers? Well, this is because there are so many different factors that influence how your body can handle alcohol.

So while four or five drinks may leave one person feeling very drunk others may still feel relatively sober. Let’s take a look at some of these factors:

How Much You’ve Eaten

Your body will react differently to alcohol based on how much food you’ve eaten that day. Particularly in terms of carbs, protein, and micro-nutrients. The less you’ve eaten before you drink, the drunker you’ll feel.

How Many Liquids You’ve Consumed

We’re talking about non-alcoholic drinks here. Alcohol dehydrates the body and so you’ll experience more adverse effects if you have a lower hydration level.

How Much Sleep You’ve Had

If your body is running on a lot less sleep and has a lot less energy, you’ll find yourself getting drunker and thus more hungover in the morning.

Vodka & Rum Have Different Compositions

So, both vodka and rum have completely different processes before evolving into their final states (see also ‘Best Russian Vodka‘). Both use quite different ingredients too, so as you might expect since they don’t taste similar. Rum tends to be much stronger and flavorsome while vodka could be described as fairly bland.

Vodka

Vodka is made from wheat or potatoes, neither of which have particularly pungent flavors. Unless it is combined with other flavors or fruits it will almost always be clear too. And due to its fermentation and distillation it does not require ageing. Vodka has an alcohol of about 37.5%

Rum

Rum, on the other hand, is made from molasses and sugarcane, both of which are known for being very flavorsome and super sweet. Rum does need to be aged after its fermentation and distillation and tends to have an alcohol content of around 35.5%

Despite their differences, though, you can definitely mix the two together because they share the main component – alcohol. There won’t be any adverse reaction when you consume the two together. The only thing that will really matter is how much of them you drink.

Rum and Vodka Drinks

Now that we know you can mix rum and vodka, let’s explore these rum and vodka cocktail recipes. We always recommend using locally distilled craft rum and vodka from a local distillery near you. If you enjoy this easy to make rum and vodka punch recipe, please leave a comment below.

Rum and Vodka Punch

Rum and Vodka Punch is a fun, delicious mixed drink that’s easy to make and is flexible depending ingredients you have at home. For example the orange juice can replaced with pineapple juice, grenadine can be replaced with simple syrup, coconut syrup, strawberry, or raspberry syrup.

• Fill hurricane or pint glass with ice
• 1 ounce vodka (flavored vodka works too, we recommend locally distilled vodka)
• 1 ounce rum (coconut rum is delicious, but white or dark rum work too. Local rum is best!)
• Splash of grenadine
• Splash of orange juice
• Fill glass almost full with cranberry juice
• Top with soda
• Stir, garnish with orange slice, cherry, and/or pineapple! Enjoy responsibly.

Rum and Vodka Jungle Juice

Rum and Vodka mix well together in Jungle Juice- another fun cocktail to make, especially for a party. I remember being at a party that made gallons of jungle juice to celebrate a special occasion! Mixing Rum and Vodka provides a good mix of flavor and strength- so be careful not to make your jungle juice recipe with vodka and rum too strong!

• Equal part locally distilled rum (any rum works, though we like white rum)
• Equal part locally distilled vodka
• Equal part triple sec
• Splash of dark rum for a dark rum float (not required)
• Juice(s)- Orange, Pineapple, Cranberry, Fruit Punch, Lemonade
• Fresh fruit garnish- strawberries, pineapple, oranges, lemons, limes, whatever you have!

Mix together in glass for one servicing or you can make this in a pitcher to make multiple. Serve on ice and enjoy responsibly.

Preventing The Adverse Effects

The adverse effects that you’ll feel after drinking a large amount of vodka and rum will be the same as those of consuming any large quantity of alcohol.

If you’re hoping to avoid that nasty hangover in the morning, you’ll want to take the following precautionary measures:

Drink Water

Drinking alcohol will dehydrate your body. Ensuring that you drink a glass or two of water throughout the night helps to stop you being so dehydrated. This can help you avoid that pounding head in the morning.

Big Meals

Drinking alcohol on an empty stomach is never a good idea. Always make sure that your stomach is full before you start drinking so that you can ‘soak’ it up and have the necessary energy to handle the liquor.

Drink In Moderation

Simply put, the more alcohol you drink, the worse you’re going to feel in the morning. So if you want to avoid a hangover it is important to pace yourself throughout the night.

Final Thoughts

You can mix vodka and rum together as it will not cause you to get sick. Despite what people may tell you, the mixing of alcohol won’t actually have that big of an effect. What will have an effect is the amount of alcohol that you consume.

Of course, when you are mixing different alcohols together, keeping track of just how much you’re consuming can be difficult. This is why people might tell you not to mix your drinks.

If you are going to enjoy a boozy cocktail, maybe limit it to just one or two if you’re hoping to wake up in the morning without a pounding headache or a sick stomach.