RUM’S MOJO
GET ON ISLAND TIME this summer by cracking open the rum and making a piña colada or fruity rum punch. Many islands in the Caribbean produce rum and are the birthplace of some of the coolest Caribbean cocktails.
Some of the best rum comes from Guyana – though located in the northeastern shoulder of South America, it’s a part of the Caribbean community. Demerara Distillers Limited (DDL) has close to 350 years of expertise in the art of rum distillation. It produces 16 fantastic rums and rum products under the El Dorado label, many aged in former whiskey barrels. A little lesson in provenance: Demerara rum can only be made in Guyana. The name comes from the river that runs through the capital of Georgetown and the region – a prized area for rum production. Sugar cane, from which molasses is derived to make Demerara rum, is cultivated mostly in the rich, fertile aluvial coastal plains of the county of Demerara, along the banks of the Demerara River. Molasses is produced by the boiling of sugar cane juice, which separates crystallized sugar from this dark treacly by-product. It is the unique quality of this locally produced molasses, the basis of Demerara Distillers’ rum production, which contributes so much to the distinctive Demerara taste.
Two premium rums from DDL that recently were listed in Ontario are El Dorado 8 Year Old and El Dorado Spiced rum. The 8 Year Old is fantastic rum at a bargain price ($29.95). It’s a blend of rums – all a minimum of eight years old – from four of the traditional stills including a double wooden pot still from Port Mourant, Guyana, and an original 134-yearold wooden continuous Coffey still. These wooden stills are the last left in the world still used in production of rum. If there are other wood stills on the planet, they are likely in museums. The wooden pot stills were originally used to produce the Demerara Navy rums of old. All this to say the 8 Year Old is unique. I just love it. Rich with deep, full rum flavours, it’s medium-bodied, layered and exceptionally smooth with notes of spiced oak and molasses. Use it to make awesome premium cocktails.
The spiced rum is a blend of aged Demerara rums and natural spices, full of vanilla pod and cinnamon stick flavours with a mild clove-like finish and hints of citrus. Not sweet – just good well-spiced rum – this makes a good drink simply on the rocks or used to jazz up a cocktail.
Lemon Hart 151 Demerara rum used to be bulk shipped from Guyana to the Hiram Walker and Sons Distillery in Ontario where it was aged. But that’s changed, with the rum now 100 per cent Guyanese with all of it aged in Guyana and then bottled in Canada by the Newfoundland and Labrador Liquor Corporation (Rock Spirits).
Rock Spirits also bottles Newfoundland Screech, the iconic Canadian brand of rum. Newfoundland Screech Honey rum recently released in Ontario is its first line extension. Made from a blend of imported Jamaican rums and flavoured with natural honey and orange peel, the aromat-
ics of orange zest and honey come through gently on the nose. Smooth on the palate, the touch of honey and orange both liven it up and soften its screechy bite. Pour on ice for easy sipping or mix your choice of juice.
Another new rum-based product is Malibu Rum Sparkler. Housed in a champagne-style bottle, Malibu claims this sparkling cocktail is the first of its kind to use coconut water as a key ingredient. Colourless and clear, it has a strong aroma of both fresh and dried coconut, which carries through in its bubbly delivery. Somewhat sweet, it’s an easy drinking product that you need only chill and pour into flutes.
It’s not just the Caribbean that has a lock on rum. Gosling’s Black Seal rum is so ubiquitous in Bermuda as to be synonymous with it. Black Seal is everywhere on this tiny 53 square-kilometre paradise of pinksand beaches, gorgeous verdant golf courses and turquoise waters, smack in the mid-Atlantic Ocean. The delicious and savoury Bermudian fish chowder, dark and thick with shredded fish, is served with cruets of Black Seal and sherry pepper sauce to add to taste. The minute a roof goes on a house here, it’s christened with Black Seal in a “roof wetting ceremony.” The Dark ’n’ Stormy, however, that is the island’s most famous use of Gosling’s rum. It’s a beautiful looking drink that’s surprisingly simple to make. You fill a glass with ice and a good natural ginger beer (Gosling’s makes one but any good version works) and float Gosling’s Black Seal on top. “The cocktail looks like a dark, stormy night with the colour of a cloud that only a fool or dead man would sail under,” said Malcolm
Gosling, seventh-generation owner of the rum company. Stir it well before you drink it or your first gulp will be straight rum.
But the Caribbean still packs the proverbial rum punch, with standouts from Barbados and Jamaica. And on a recent trip to Puerto Rico, I visited the Bacardi rum distillery. The company’s free distillery tour in Cantaño includes two drinks per person, so no surprise that it draws crowds from morning to closing. The Puerto Rico distillery goes 24-7 and produces 100,000 gallons of rum a day from imported molasses. Bacardi was founded by Don Facundo Bacardí Massó in Cuba in 1862. Now the largest privately held family-owned spirits company in the world, it set up production facilities in other countries (including in Brampton, Ont.) after the Cuban Revolution.
Bacardi’s biggest seller is Bacardi Superior Blanco, a light bodied white rum that’s charcoal filtered. Sweet, soft and smooth with a touch of vanilla, it’s tailor-made for cocktails. Use this to make a piña colada – the drink originated in Puerto Rico, created at the Caribe Hilton Puerto Rico in 1954 by bartender Ramón “Monchito” Marrero. Then sit back and dream of azure waters and white sand beaches. —Margaret Swaine