Colombia’s Refajo Is Simplicity at Its Finest

On an afternoon so hot that even the breeze had stopped in its tracks, I was already questioning Medellín’s moniker as Colombia’s City of Eternal Spring, just two weeks after relocating there from New York. I squeezed into the singular patch of shade beneath a eucalyptus tree with a friend, languishing on the grass at his farmhouse in the mountains outside of the city. He reached for my hand: “¿Refajémonos?” I grasped at recesses of my decade-plus of Spanish studies and found nothing. Was this some sort of inappropriate propositioning I’d as of yet been spared from? Mercifully, no. I’d just bumped into one of Colombia’s most beloved beverages for the very first time: Refajo.

A beginner bartender’s dream, the Refajo is so simple to assemble that it almost feels too basic to be called a cocktail at all. An ice-cold mixture of light beer and soda, the Refajo is a summertime staple that is far from unique to Colombia. But over the past few decades, the shandy has become so ubiquitous in the drinking culture across the South American country that it has shifted from an object to a verb, à la Google.

“Refajo has been popular in Colombia for at least the past 30 or 40 years,” says Luis R. Vidal, an anthropologist at the Colegio Mayor de Antioquia in Medellín who studies the intersection of food, drinks and culture. It is a clever hangover cure, an ingenious way to extend the beer supply, and a cooling accompaniment for a hot day, all at once. “But more than anything, Refajo is a social drink at its core, one that we associate with large gatherings, celebrations, and spending time together,” says Vidal.

The classic recipe is nothing more than equal parts light beer and Colombiana, an almost cloyingly sweet soda that smacks of citrus and bubblegum and is frequently compared to cream soda, for the North American palate, or Inca Kola, for those who know their way around the South American beverage scene. However, the Refajo isn’t without its regional variations; on Colombia’s Caribbean coast, for example, it is frequently made with a local favorite, Kola Román.

The simplicity of the Refajo gives it legs, and with them the at-home bartender runs. Riffs can involve adding a splash of orange juice, slices of fruit for garnish, a dash of aguardiente for a true kick, or adjusting the beer-to-soda ratio to balance for sweetness.