American Rum Report #25 — March 13, 2020
~ In This Report ~
#1: Three recurring themes that breed skepticism of American rum 🤔
#2: Todd Thrasher of Potomac Distilling Co. (makers of Thrasher's Rum in Washington, D.C.) reflects on a year in business and the future of American rum 🏛️
#3: Why can't your favorite American rum distillery ship you rum? 📦
#4: Quick links 🔥
#1: Three recurring themes that breed skepticism of American rum 🤔
If someone asks me to recommend a rum review website, I always start with The Lone Caner—Lance Surujbally's vast repository of reviews dating back to 2013.
Lance consistently goes beyond the realm of boilerplate tasting notes to provide key contextual and historical information that helps you understand the rum he's reviewing is much more than just something to be scored.
So whenever I see him review an American rum, my ears perk up a little extra. I know his review won't just contain an opinion about a single rum. It'll also contain insight into the category itself.
His recent review of PX Limited Edition Rum from Mad River Distillers in Vermont is no exception.
Specifically, the review touches on three themes that are key to understanding the skepticism the category often inspires in rum aficionados across the globe.
1. Wide Portfolios of Spirits:
"This leads to my oft-repeated remark that American distillers seem to like making whiskies, gins, vodkas and other stuff — and produce rum not because of real love for the spirit but as a sort of afterthought to round out the portfolio and provide some immediate cash flow while their hoped-for next Pappy is ageing."
Lance is not alone in this view. As I documented in "Why Are Hundreds of American Distilleries Suddenly Producing Rum?", many American rum producers agree!
There are, of course, perfectly reasonable economic motivations for diversifying your spirits portfolio as a craft distillery (and Lance points this out at the end of his review). But that doesn't change the perception that you can't truly master something without giving it all of your focus.
This perception creates an uphill battle for producers—whether you find it fair or not—and that makes it worth acknowledging.
2. Misleading Descriptions
Early in the review, Lance offers an overview of Mad River's current lineup of rums, which includes an unaged expression the distillery has labelled an "American Demerara" rum. He writes:
"So named probably because it’s made from Demerara sugar, and I have a feeling there’s a potential trademark violation accusation there somewhere if DDL ever hears about it."
(DDL stands for Diamona Distillers Limited, the makers of El Dorado.)
I shared my own concerns about this "American Demerara" rum in a previous Release Radar email back in October. To sum it up, this descriptor is at best ill informed and at worst actively misleading. Here's what I wrote about why:
"If you're familiar with the larger rum world, you know the term Demerara rum is reserved for the rich, smokey rums produced in Guyana.
"These days, they all come from the country's only remaining rum distillery, Demerara Distillers Limited (DDL). Diamond Reserve and the popular El Dorado are the distillery's two house brands, but brands like Lemon Hart, Pusser's, Hamilton, and others source from DDL as well. When someone mentions Demerara rum, they're talking about Guyanese rum.
"So 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."
Lance's reaction is exactly what I expected when I outlined the issues with it above. When distilleries misuse descriptors like this, rum fans will immediately mistrust them. Meanwhile, it's not like the term "Demerara" is going to earn you any bonus points with the uninitiated drinker who has no clue it's associated with a famous rum-making region.
What's the upside to being loose with language and categorization? There is none. And yet, if you have read this newsletter for awhile, you've probably seen me show several examples like this every single month.
We always preach the virtues of education's role in spreading the truth of rum's value to more consumers. But if producers aren't even educating themselves first, what are we even doing?
3. Lack of Information
One of my biggest personal gripes with new producers is how difficult it can be to find any production information about their rum.
Labels are in such a rush to preach the virtues of hand crafted, small batch, artisanal processes handed down from some mythical great grandfather who once knew a guy who made rum in a secret outhouse during prohibition...they often forget to tell you anything about how the rum is actually made.
And when you're fuzzy on the details, you leave room for doubt. PX Rum, for example, is aged in both new oak barrels and Pedro Ximenez sherry barrels, but figuring out exactly how long it's been aged in each cask type is a challenge. Lance writes:
"The ageing is also never spelled out on the bottle or the website – not the ageing of the base rum, nor the duration of the finishing in PX. We have no idea what the complete outturn is, so grading the words “Limited Edition” is impossible. And so these niggling omissions in turn cast doubts (mine) on the 'scrappy independent,' 'we love what we do' origin story on their website, which I’ve learned the hard way to always regard with some skepticism."
Much like the second theme, this one is easy to fix. Like it's a middle school math test, just show your work. Whether on your label or on your website (but, preferably, on both) make it easy for people to understand how your rum is made.
Brand stories are great, and I understand they can be a powerful sales tool, but they shouldn't be the only thing that makes your rum unique.
Here's the link to Lance's review again, which offers more thoughts on the American rum category than I've mentioned here. Check it out!
#2: Todd Thrasher of Potomac Distilling Co. reflects on a year in business and what's next for Thrasher's Rum 🏛️
This is a quick little Q&A that offers some nice insight on what the first year was like for the D.C. distillery that slapped a big rum-themed smokestack on the city's waterfront:
Of particular interest to me were the distillery's plans for the next year:
"I haven’t really announced it too much but we added a coconut rum to the lineup. We sold through the first run of it and we’re halfway through the second run. Trying to ramp up the production of the coconut rum especially because I think it will be a big summertime flavor. We made it at 80 proof and there’s no sugar added after distillation. People that are used to Malibu maybe won’t get it at the beginning because there’s no sugar added, but I think people will really dig it. We’ll have a lot more coconut cocktails. We’ve also laid a bunch of barrels down we’re not releasing this year. In June 2021 we will be doing our first barrel release."
I've never been a huge flavored rum person, but it is nice to see more and more American producers creating flavored rums that allow you to actually taste the rum.
#3: Why can't your favorite American rum distillery ship you rum? 📦
If you've ever fretted over the sheer difficulty of attempting to purchase bottles of the rums discussed in this newsletter, believe me—the folks making the rum are madder about it than you are.
Direct-to-consumer shipping would absolutely change the craft spirits game for producers and consumers alike, so why hasn't it become a thing yet?
This primer from Wine Searcher is a great overview of all the factors preventing it. Here's the TL;DR, but I encourage you to read the whole article:
"The reason is not federal law, nor even state law. It's the ABSENCE of state laws specifically allowing common carriers to ship spirits. It seems to be a loophole that legislators forgot about in the wake of the 2005 US Supreme Court decision that ultimately opened most of the country to direct shipping from wineries.
"Many states have laws now that specifically address shipping of wine. But whiskey and other spirits were mostly left out of the laws. And that ambiguity is holding back the industry."
Here's the link one more time.
#4: Quick Links 🔥
Let's hit a few items rapid-fire before we go today:
A look inside Three of Strong Spirits' bar in Portland, Maine— Sigh. If only more places offered $5 rum flights.
Fred Minnick put together an interesting Q&A with Privateer's Maggie Campbell— Come for the rum insights, stay for the takedown of using the word "dosage" in spirits.
Ziami Rum opened its distillery in Hollywood, Florida — Ziami's rums had previously been distilled by South Florida Distillers.