American Rum Report #19 — November 22, 2019
~ In This Report ~
#1: From Velier releases to category confusion—the full spectrum of American rum 🌈
#2: Montanya Distillers releases Valentia, a limited release celebrating the progress women have made in craft distilling 👩🔬(sidenote: we need a distiller emoji)
#3: Cutwater Spirits (San Diego, CA) releases a Mai Tai canned cocktail featuring its Bali Hai Tiki Gold Rum and Barrel Aged Rum 🍹
#1: From Velier releases to category confusion—the full spectrum of American rum 🌈
In the span of 24 hours this week, I came across two social media posts that, together, encapsulate the positive and negative extremes of the American rum landscape quite well.
The positive extreme came on Instagram, where Privateer Rum teased a partnership on an upcoming release with Velier, the Italian company owned by Luca Gargano that's been behind many of the larger rum universe's most sought-after releases:
Privateer: "Some different bottles to fill. So thrilled to be partnering with Velier and La Maison & Velier" (global distributor of Velier, among others)
If those bottles look familiar, it's because you've seen them in Velier's Habitation Velier releases, the company's brand that specializes in "pure single rums," defined by owner Luca Gargano as 100% pot still rum from a single distillery.
To date, Habitation Velier releases have all been from legendary distilleries like Hampden, Monymusk, Worthy Park, and Foursquare, just to name a few, all in the same distinctive bottle with labels that let the distillery and its instruments shine:
Privateer's post also featured a picture of a second Velier bottle type, which I expect means there will be a Privateer release under one of the company's other brands as well:
Perhaps 100% pot still juice for the Habitation Velier bottle (to keep with the Pure Single theme) and a blend for the other?
Regardless, the point is that this is obviously a big deal for Privateer, and perhaps the perception of what's possible with American rum as a whole. In less than a decade, Privateer went from producing rum for the first time to being featured by a brand known for sourcing unique expressions from some of the world's best distilleries. Imagine what might be possible for American producers in the next decade. Sure, not every American distillery has Maggie Campbell at the helm, but there are plenty of hungry, passionate folks dotting the country who are hellbent on making quality rum.
For now, though, this is an extreme of American rum. And while it's an encouraging sign for the category, a visit to the r/rum community on Reddit was all it took to remind me that there are less encouraging extremes as well.
Specifically, it was a post about a new release from Vermont distillery Mad River Distillers called Rum 44 American Demerara Rum:
If this sounds familiar, that means you probably read the newsletter I sent out in October that discussed this very same release. I made a point similar to the one Reddit user ArcanineNumber9 had in the post featured above:
“Describing a rum distilled in Vermont as an American Demerara rum feels like a bridge too far. Perhaps Mad River is taking a cue from their rum's base ingredient, Demerara sugar, a raw type of sugar that retains a bit more molasses than typical sugar. It used to all come from Guyana (hence the name Demerara), but nowadays you can get it from all over. I have a tub in my pantry from Florida.
“Of course, every true Demerara rum I'm familiar with is produced with molasses rather than the sugar that shares its name. So describing a rum produced with Demerara sugar as a type of Demerara rum doesn't feel accurate.
“Perhaps the label has nothing to do with the rum's base ingredient and Mad River is simply seeking to replicate some of the key characteristics of Demerara rum in a tribute of sorts to the historic category.
“I'm sure there's a reason, but my fear is that a term like American Demerara rum will only cause confusion about a great category of rum with a 300+ year history. Most people who visit this distillery will have never heard of Demerara rum. Will this rum be an authentic representation of the category?”
Of course, this type of labelling faux pas does more than just sow confusion across the broader rum category. It also feeds the skepticism many rum drinkers already have toward American rum, some of which stems from general frustrations with craft distilleries as a whole.
Earlier this month, spirits writer Jake Emen touched on these frustrations in an article for Distiller.com titled, "What We Consumers Want from Craft Distilleries." Of particular importance is an idea he called "meaningful locality," which seems to elude so many good-intentioned small distilleries:
“Okay, so maybe you really are the first distillery in the fourth largest county in Idaho. But if you’re bringing in crates of Caribbean sugarcane and have hired some guy from New York to make a tropical rum for you, who cares? In other words, being local is one thing, but having meaningful locality is another.”
Meaningful locality—the American rum producers who are earning an increasingly good reputation for themselves among the broader rum community excel at this. For example:
Privateer Rum: Pick up a bottle, scroll through its website, or read any interview in which president and head distiller Maggie Campbell describes how the local environment shapes their rum—everything about the product they are producing and the brand they are building says New England. Sure, they import their molasses from Guatemala, but colonial New England rum distillers imported theirs, too.
Richland Rum: A single estate distillery that grows its own sugarcane, boils the juice into syrup, and ferments and distills everything on site in pot stills. What do the bottles say? Old Georgia Rum.
Montanya Distillers: If you ever hear Montanya founder Karen Hoskin talk about how her distillery makes rum, you're likely to learn all about the unique characteristics that come from making and aging it at 9,000 feet above sea level. Every label that bears the description "High Mountain Rum" reminds you of the environment that shaped what's in the bottle.
Bayou Rum from Louisiana Distillers: You know this rum comes from Louisiana within half a second of looking at a bottle. It's also made from raw Louisiana cane sugar and molasses from the oldest family-owned sugar mill in the U.S.
Koloa Rum Company and Manulele Distillers (producers of Ko Hana Rum): Two vastly different rum producers from the state of Hawaii in terms of both scale and products, but both understand meaningful locality about as well as any other distillery you'll find.
I could name more, but you get the point. The American rum distilleries nailing this concept of meaningful locality aren't the only ones making good rum or running successful businesses, but they certainly seem to have the most powerful and authentic stories to tell.
You can't achieve meaningful locality by slapping tropical-sounding descriptors on your label. Or trying to backdoor your way onto the coattails of rum categories you can't by definition even make.
And listen—my point isn't to make Mad River Distillers out to be the poster child for inauthenticity in American rum. Prior to this puzzling "American Demerara Rum" release, I'd heard good things about their PX Rum and Maple Cask Rum (which does have meaningful locality, given that it's aged in rum barrels that were used to age locally produced maple syrup).
It's also true that misleading or inauthentic statements are not exclusive to American rum producers. You'll find them in rum worldwide.
But the American rum category already faces an uphill battle in convincing rum drinkers it has something authentic to offer. It's certainly possible, as the positive extremes have shown us. And that makes pruning the negative extremes all the more important.
#2: Montanya Distillers releases Valentia, a limited release celebrating the progress women have made in the craft distilling industry 👩🔬
After numerous mentions over the past couple months, the official announcement finally came!
On Friday, November 22 (today), Montanya is releasing Valentia at its distillery in Crested Butte, Colorado.
There are many ways in which Valentia is the first release of its kind:
It was created by women at every stage of production. As Montanya wrote in its announcement: "It is female distilled in a female-owned distillery, finished in a barrel that comes from a female-owned and female-distilled Rye, and will be bottled by an all-female bottling crew." Fittingly, the word valentia is Spanish for courage, bravery, or grittiness. Hell yeah!
At four years (3.5 in used whiskey barrels, six months in used Catoctin Creek rye barrels), it's Montanya's longest-aged bottling to date.
It's the first Montanya release to not include a tiny touch of local honey, a practice that has always been more about adding a hint of local flair than any desire to make the rum sweeter. Regardless, I'm sure this will please many rum enthusiasts.
Valentia is also the Colorado distillery's first release since Constellation Brands acquired a minority stake in the business, and the first to feature its new bottle design. Constellation Brands helped the distillery develop the bottle design with the aid of a market study.
Other relevant details: as with all of Montanya's releases, it features a base of unrefined, raw crystalized Louisiana cane and molasses that is pot distilled and bottled at 80 proof. The retail price is $54.99.
It's a limited release, but it does seem that some bottles will be distributed outside Colorado. Where exactly remains to be seen. If you happen upon a bottle, shoot me an email and let me know what you think of it!
#3: Cutwater Spirits (San Diego, CA) releases a Mai Tai canned cocktail featuring its Bali Hai Tiki Gold Rum and Barrel Aged Rum 🍹
To the chagrin of tiki purists everywhere, the canned Mai Tai also features natural coconut and pineapple flavors (according to this article), which means this ain't exactly a Trader Vic original.
And if we're going by the cocktail recipes featured on Cutwater's website, it's not even how you make a Cutwater Mai Tai:
Jokes aside, canned cocktails aren't really the place to "well, actually" an ingredients list. If you go in expecting an authentic cocktail experience, you're missing the point. They're convenient approximations, not replacements.
Cutwater's success with canned cocktails was a big part of Anheuser-Busch InBev's motivation for acquiring the company earlier this year (the beer giant's first spirits acquisition at the time). At the time, I was curious to see how that would impact Cutwater's approach to rum over time.
So far, it's meant a series of rum and rum liqueurs that are also directly tied to the world of tiki. Since the acquisition, Cutwater has released:
Bali Hai Tiki Dark Rum: A blend of the distillery's four-year-old barrel aged rum and unaged white rum that's bottled at 80 proof. (My guess is caramel color is added as well, but I don't know for sure.)
Bali Hai Tiki Monkey: A 37 proof rum-based liqueur with cream, cocoa nibs, banana and coffee flavors, and caramel color.
Bali Hai Day of the Dead Spirit: This is an interesting one. Released to celebrate Dia De Los Muertos, it's a 70 proof rum distilled from cane sugar and sugar skulls from Guadalajara and infused with cinnamon, allspice, and piloncillo (basically, cones of unrefined panela sugar).
As I wrote after the release of Bali Hai Tiki Dark back in April, it's not surprising to see more overtly tiki-positioned releases with the tiki revival in full force.
The company's success with canned cocktails may have been the big motivator of the A-B InBev acquisition, but Cutwater might also be finding smaller scale success with tiki-tinged rums and rum liqueurs.