Quick service tip before the story: the full ingredient list is right here, ready to order. Here's how this cocktail came to be.
The Margarita has at least three credible origin stories. The most cited places it in Tijuana, 1938, where bartender Carlos "Danny" Herrera invented it at his restaurant Rancho La Gloria for an American actress named Marjorie King, who was allergic to every spirit except tequila. Another version credits Dallas socialite Margarita Sames, who claimed she mixed it at a 1948 pool party in Acapulco.
A third theory links it to the older Tequila Daisy ("margarita" means "daisy" in Spanish) documented in 1930s U.S. border towns. Whatever the truth, the Margarita climbed from Mexican backstreet to global superstar, earning in the U.S. its own unofficial holiday (National Margarita Day) and a permanent crown as the world's most ordered tequila cocktail.
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