Lately I’ve seen two American-made cane spirits being sold as either “agricole” or “agricole style” rum. Both are made from what they term “evaporated cane juice”. To the uninitiated, this seems logical enough—rhum agricole is made from cane juice, so evaporated cane juice is basically the same thing, right? Sorry, no. Not even close.
Evaporated cane juice is nothing more than raw sugar (aka turbinado, or Demerara sugar [often a misnomer]) which is to say it’s white crystalline sugar with a light coating of molasses on it. If you make a distillate from raw sugar, you have not made rhum agricole, you have made “sugarshine”.
Real agricole is made from the fresh-pressed juice of sugarcane. Period. It’s mostly made in the French West Indies on islands like Martinique and Guadeloupe, but recently, some small distilleries in the United States have started making agricole style rums.
I read recently that Germany is the main recipient of a small percentage of really good rum Agricole or Cachaca exports from S. America. I’m headed to Munich in a week or so and will be on the look out for a good taste or two or three.
(http://rumproject.com/rumforum/viewtopic.php?t=102)
🎱 The struggle is real and this rabbit hole just got interesting. Per a conversation I had with Mr. Jay Gibbs regarding white oak barrel staves: “…you gotta get it burning good.”
So while in Germany, still here by the way, I did get a taste of some very good Panama rum Aged in a small 5G cask. Very aromatic, went down with a little burn, and finished clean. Decided to pass on the bottle, €48/$56 for 750ml. I’ll just wait a few more months for some of my rum to age. )
🎱 The struggle is real and this rabbit hole just got interesting. Per a conversation I had with Mr. Jay Gibbs regarding white oak barrel staves: “…you gotta get it burning good.”
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