Monday, August 18, 2008
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As you and I continue our
August Spotlight on Old New Orleans Rum, we come to the first product in their line of offerings, the Old New Orleans Crystal Rum. I say first because I have to start somewhere; and after
the distillery tour, why not start with the most basic of any company's rum: their white / blanco / crystal / plantinum / claro / blanc...you get the idea.
The crystal rum is created by distilling blackstrap molasses produced from Louisiana sugar cane. The rum is then briefly aged in a barrel at a very high proof - 157 proof (just under 80% abv) to be exact. The aging and blending of the rum, combined with the addition of a few drops of water per bottle, bring the rum back down to the more standard 80 proof (40% abv). Madagascar vanilla is also added to the batch to provide some smoothness and additional flavor to the product.
The rum is produced in small batches - as are all the Old New Orleans rums. In fact, only 500 gallons are produced at a time. This affords the small cadre of rum fanatics at Celebration Distillation a great deal of control over the final product.
The bottle for the Crystal is the standard Old New Orleans bottle, with a white label on the front, and their trademark artwork on the back-interior. The artwork appears on every bottle of Old New Orleans Rum, regardless of the offering, and is actually created by the owner and founder of Celebration Distillation and Old New Orleans Rum, James Michalopoulos - who is probably better-known for his work as
a painter and artist than as the entrepreneur behind a line of New Orleans-produced rums. OK, perhaps not to the frequent readers of this site...but I'm sure there are people out there that follow art more closely than rum. To each their own I guess.
Appearances
The rum, both in the bottle and in the glass, is nearly crystal clear. There is a slight yellow hue to it when you hold the glass up to the light. Giving my glass its ceremonial swirl reveals decent legs that run down the sides of the glass and back in to the bowl.
Nose
I was very excited to get to this review because I was doing so with a brand new tasting glass. I recently received the Flare sipper from Spirit Sippers. I decided to use this review to compare it and my usual non-specialized tasting glass. There will be more on this in a future piece, but I figured I should mention that I've changed part of my review process by using an additional glass type.
The Crystal Rum has a strong vanilla note on the nose - which is to be expected. The vanilla is quickly followed by the scent of toasted sugar, and then the familiar scent of alcohol vapor. The alcohol scent is fairly mild, but expected in a white rum due to the short aging period.
All in all the nose is fairly simple, but very pleasant and rich.
Palate
And now to the best part: the tippilng. The entry is very sweet and sugary. The initial flavor is sweet enough to almost be a syrup, especially in combination with the buttery texture to the body. The rum is very rich, with vanilla and toffee flavors all the way through to the finish. The burn is minimal...almost non-existent. Just like the nose, the rum is very pleasant. I wouldn't consider it to be an "every day" sipper, but it is definitely a spirit that you could drink neat or on the rocks - and that's not something I say very often about white rums.
In fact, the only other white rum I can think of that I've enjoyed this much neat is probably
Oronoco from Brazil - although the flavor profiles are stunningly different. Whereas the Oronoco is a light and refreshing spirit, the Old New Orleans Crystal seems to cling tightly to its Louisiana culinary heritage with a rich and buttery texture. It's a completely different experience.
This difference in body is really intriguing. Based on the heaviness of the body, the rum didn't strike me as ideal for a daiquiri. Still, I made one up and tried it out. It's a very different drink with the New Orleans Crystal. Heavier, richer...not terms you generally associate with a daiquiri. At first this difference was a little off-putting, but with some additional lime and slightly less sugar on my second glass, I found a mix that was just terrific. I'd recommend that any cocktail that calls for sugar and white rum should have the sugar portion reduced if using the New Orleans Crystal - you just won't need it.
The Long & The Short Of It
Maybe I'm going soft in my old age...but I really enjoyed this white rum. I did. Not that I don't like white rums at all, but I very rarely find one that really captures me. The Old New Orleans Crystal has a unique flavor profile that I can only call "intriguing". It's sweet - perhaps too sweet for some - but very good and very full-bodied. And
at less than $30US per bottle, its combination of quality and affordability make it a bottle that you really should have on your shelf.
Dood's Rating: 4 Bottles of Rum Out of 5
Dood's Other Rum Reviews
Filed Under: rum,rum reviews,new orleans
Monday, August 11, 2008
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Is it really time for MxMo again? Really? Didn't we just do this like 2 weeks ago? I could have sworn I just finished writing about Hurricanes and why Pat O'Brien's is not where to get them. Well, too soon or not, it's time for another monthly foray into my pretend-life as a mixologist.
This month's round-up is being hosted by Save The Drinkers, who chose to give us a great deal of latitude on the topic of Local Flavors:
The idea is to post one of two types of drinks:
Option 1: Gather ingredients that are representative of the culture/geography/tackiness of your respective cities and make a drink with a truly place-based style. For example, huckleberries are native to the geographical area where I live, as are elderflowers, potatoes, and extremely conservative, closet-case politicians. (I’m just saying!)
Option 2: Dig up an old drink that came from your city and revive it! If you can find the original bar, that would be even more interesting.
Seems simple enough. I happen to live in Orange County, California. Home to - well - oranges, strawberries, watermelon, and a psuedo-Hollywood vapid lifestyle underscored by a button-down corporate culture lead by a maniacal company with a mouse as its mascot. Let's just say there were a few different directions I could go with this one.
I sat around discussing the possibilities with my brother. Strawberries are out of season, oranges sound a tad obvious, and while watermelon does sound intriguing, I live alone and that's a lot of leftovers. My brother, ever the helpful gent, suggested, "Do a cocktail but 'Disney it up'...you know, no booze, all syrups and mixers and water, and then charge $14 for it!" I know he was joking, but there seemed to be something deviously cool about this idea. A cocktail inspired by the driving force behind much of what has come to define Orange County.
Having already stated that I didn't want to actually use oranges, I decided instead to go with liquors and liqueurs that would lend an orange flavor to the drink on their own. I stared at my rum shelf and the rum choice was all but obvious. I had to use the Pyrat XO rum. It has strong orange notes to it, as well as that semi-industrial, unrefined pot-still flavor that you find in some rums. The combination of the two, while quite tasty in some drinks, manages to give the rum a rather "manufactured" rather than "crafted" taste. That was perfect for what I wanted to do.
Now that I had my base spirit, I needed a concept. I'm bad at concepts. I tend to drink 2-ingredient cocktails or sip rum neat because I'm lazy and it requires less thinking and actual work than what, say, Rick does. I pondered the kind of drinks associated with Southern California. I thought of Bloody Marys, Margaritas, Beverly Hills Iced Teas....and then lightning struck my brain. Using the Beverly Hills Iced Tea as inspiration, I moved on to my other ingredients: orange liqueur (more orange! MORE!!), agave nectar, and champagne.
I didn't have any champagne, but before running out to the store to buy some, I figured I'd give the rest of the recipe a test run. I mixed together the ingredients, poured over crushed ice, and topped with soda just to give it a little bit of the effervescence that I was going to get from the champagne. The drink actually wasn't bad. It wasn't great, but it had all the elements I was looking for. It was orangey, it had a psuedo-manufactured taste to it, and it was somewhat light. The agave nectar gave it some tanginess that I thought was pretty good - plus it was agave in SoCal - I'm a genius. It still wasn't quite right for a $14 House-of-the-Mouse cocktail. So this morning I ventured out to the store and secured a small bottle of brut champagne, and the one thing I thought was missing most from the night before: mint.
Everything in place, I set about mixing my new creation: The Tragic Kingdom
Tragic Kingdom
1 oz Pyrat XO Rum
.5 oz Orange Liqueur (Clement Creole Shrubb)
.5 oz Agave Nectar
2 dashes bitters (Angostura)
14 mint leaves
Combine rum and mint leaves in a shaker and muddle well to release the menthol into the rum. Add orange liqueur, agave nectar, bitters, and ice and shake. Strain into a cocktail glass, half-filled with crushed ice. Top off with champagne, garnish with a mint sprig.
Once completed, I gave the drink a quick stir to better mix in the champagne, and took a sip. The drink was actually pretty darned good. It had plenty of the orange flavor to it, but it was balanced fairly well with the mint and the champagne. I handed it to a nearby victim - err - mother, and almost didn't get my glass back. It was light and refreshing, and far too good to actually be anything that they'd really serve at the theme parks (if they served cocktails at the theme parks).
Thinking that these ingredients might be a bit high-brow for what they would serve at the resort, I tried to cheapen it up a bit, substituting Sailor Jerry for the Pyrat, and orange curacao for the Shrubb. While I don't think that the curacao substitution was particularly harmful, the swap for the Sailor was fatal. The drink was just not that good. In fact, it was so far below the original recipe, that while shaking the crushed ice out of the blender, the glass jumped up and smacked itself on the blender, sending a large piece of broken glass skittering across the counter. The drink (once remade sans-glass) was sweet in all the wrong ways, and left a rather odd aftertaste in the mouth.
No, the first time seemed to be the charm. This drink (which I'm currently sipping again) is actually a pretty good summer drink: light and citrusy, with that curious tanginess from the agave nectar and the refreshing effervescence of the champagne. In a way, I think it kind of captures the odd mixture of the local cultures, and the facade of manufactured refinement that these former agricultural towns try to hard to put up. And, in the end, just like OC itself, it turns out to be pretty darned enjoyable. Of course, it won't really capture OC unless someone will start paying me $20 for one of these bad boys. Any takers?
Be sure to check out Dood's other Mixology Monday entries
Wednesday, August 06, 2008
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During Tales of the Cocktail this year, I decided to make a trip down to see Celebration Distillation – home of Old New Orleans Rum. I wanted to get an inside look at how this small American distillery was producing a unique collection of rums that they claim captures the essence of the Crescent City in a bottle.
I spent the morning putting together some notes, and then grabbed a taxi from the Hotel Monteleone to the distillery. The two buildings are only about 3.5 miles apart, but I didn't want to end up lost and figured a cab would be the right way to go. The drive there took a tad longer than I had expected as we navigated the numerous one-way streets of the French Quarter and then traveled through several neighborhoods that were still showing signs of the destruction wrought by Hurricane Katrina. It was a rather jarring reminder that – despite the signs of improvement in the French Quarter – New Orleans has still not fully recovered.
My plan worked like a charm, and we ended up lost in a cluster of industrial buildings, driving up and down rocky, uneven roads. Eventually we found ourselves on the other side of the tracks (literally) and after some searching about, we finally found a modest warehouse on Frenchmen Street in the Gentilly neighborhood with a sign for Old New Orleans Rum, and figured we'd found the right place.
My cab driver gave me his phone number so that I could easily get a ride back (for those of you who wish to go on this tour, I later learned that the friendly people at Celebration Distillation will be more than happy to arrange a taxi back to your hotel), and I ventured inside the open warehouse.
Stepping through the office door, I wandered directly in to the tasting area, where I ran in to Ben Gersh – General Manager for Old New Orleans rum. Ben seemed to be in a hurry (he was preparing to leave for a session at Tales), but stopped and asked me if I was there for a tour. When I responded that I was, he directed me to join one that had just started – pointing in the direction of 2 men being led by another gentleman through the distillery.
The interior of the warehouse was filled with barrels and equipment. The rums produced by 
Celebration are distilled and aged all within the walls of this dusty warehouse. There are a few tables scattered about for filling out paperwork, and a small tiki-style bar next door to the blending room.
Looking around the distillery you'd never guess that during Hurricane Katrina this building was filled with water to heights more than twice my own, causing extensive damage and loss.
Cassidy Reese – Brand Ambassador, Office Manager (and awesome bartender in the tasting room) – described the aftermath of the hurricane:
"We had approximately 14 feet of initial flood water and when the water settled it was at about 8 - 9 feet. We had to completely gut and redo the bottom floor of the distillery. Mainly the only thing that we seriously salvaged and saved post-Katrina was the column still which was cleaned and repaired and is our greatest work horse."
That still is the original still purchased by owner James Michalopoulos on a trip to Europe. The still was not originally designed for producing spirits, but rather perfume. Michalopoulos purchased the still with no real spirit in mind – just a desire to create a spirit from local produce in New Orleans. Once back in New Orleans, he found himself surrounded by sugar cane fields and the choice was obvious: New Orleans Rum.
Prior to Katrina, Celebration Distillation had been producing rum for about 10 years. After the distillery was nearly wiped out in 2005, Michalopoulos didn’t surrender. Like the city, he started the process of rebuilding.
Cassidy explained some of the effects this had on the distillery and its rums.
“Prior to Katrina our rum was made using only the column still and post-Katrina we purchased a great deal of equipment from a local brewery that went out of business and from the equipment we built our pot still (which greatly enhanced and honed the flavor) as well as all of the large cylinder holding tanks you [see through-out the distillery].”
Upon catching up to the tour, I was introduced to Chris Sule, the head distiller for Celebration. Chris joined the distillery after Hurricane Katrina, coming not from a distilling background, but rather one of brewing beer.
Chris explained that all the rums produced in the distillery are produced in 500 gallon batches. He pointed out the new pot still, which is actually a converted brewing tank. According to Chris, the difference in shape from a traditional pot still imparts a lot of “candy flavors” into the rums produced here.
Chris escorted three of us through the distillery, stopping to show us the equipment used at each step of the process. He even allowed us to sample the distillate and the varying stages, including a finger taste of the 185-proof distillate, and sipping the 150-proof - both of which were actually rather fruity and flavorful.
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Next we sampled the batch of 5-year-old single barrel (not available in stores…or anywhere other than from Chris himself actually), which was spicy but smooth, with notes of caramel, pear, cloves, and a peppery finish. From there, Chris took us in to the blending room – which is one of only 2 spaces in the entire distillery with air conditioning (the other space being the office/tasting room).
In the blending room, Chris explained more of his philosophy on creating rum – a philosophy of “taste, not science”. When asked about the process for removing impurities from his creations, he explained that while they do remove some, “if I removed all my impurities, I’d be making vodka.”
Chris then pulled out a bottle of the Old New Orleans 10 Year Old - yet another product of Katrina. As the story goes, upon returning to the distillery after the hurricane, the staff discovered several barrels of old stock floating around the room. As it turned out, some of these barrels were from the distilleries initial batches. 17 barrels of 10 year old stock were blended into a single rum to create the premier item of the Old New Orleans line of rums - available only at the distillery and select bars and restaurants. Shortly after explaining this that Chris apologized, saying that he had to run to Tales of the Cocktail for a presentation. He thanked the three of us for coming and was whisked away by Ben Gersh, leaving only poor Cassidy to deal with a blogger with a notepad and an insatiable thirst for rum.
As with any distillery tour worth its salt, one of the highlights of the Celebration Distillation tour is the time in the tasting room. I bellied up to the bar and Cassidy began pulling out bottles and cups. As she poured each rum, she gave a little background on how the rum was created, as well as the people involved (Celebration Distillation has a kickball team?). As we worked our way through the entire line, Cassidy also made a few of the distillery's signature cocktails, including the New Orleans Cajun Iced Tea. A dangerously tasty and equally powerful drink, it definitely hit the spot on such a hot day.
New Orleans Cajun Tea
1.5 oz Old New Orleans Cajun Spice Rum
0.5 oz simple syrup
Fill a hi-ball glass with ice.
Add the rum and simple syrup, and then fill the glass with unsweetened iced tea.
Stir and serve with lemon garnish.
After chatting for nearly 90 minutes with my new best friend, I looked at my watch and realized that I needed to hit the road to make it back to the Monteleone in time for my next session. I called my cab driver and told him I was ready, thanked Cassidy, and set about to take a few additional pictures.
The visit to the distillery was easily one of the highlights of my time in New Orleans. The staff are friendly and fun, you'll learn a lot about rum, and you even get to have some great cocktails. This tour is definitely something everyone should consider a must-do event when in the Crescent City.
Celebration Distillation
2815 Frenchmen Street
New Orleans, LA 70122
Ph. (504) 945-9400
www.oldneworleansrum.com
Be sure to check back for reviews of the all of the Old New Orleans Rums!
Check Out Dood's Other Distillery Tour Write-Up At Refined Vices
Technorati Tags: rum, old new orleans, distillery tour
Thursday, July 31, 2008
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Having just
spent a week in New Orleans carousing with
other spirit and cocktail bloggers, listening to various expert panels discuss the past, present, and future of spirits and cocktails, and sampling a few wares from various producers, one might say I've got the Crescent City on the brain.
I had so much fun in New Orleans that I'm going to dedicate the entire month of August to
Old New Orleans Rum. Starting next week with a
review of the distillery tour I was lucky enough to join while I was in town and then running through the entirety of their line of rums - from white to amber to spiced to the 10 year old - we'll make some cocktails, open a few bottles, and talk about how to make rum with a perfume still.
So I'll bring the rum, you bring the crawfish po'boy and the gumbo, and we'll spend the month of August having fun, cajun style.
Filed Under: rum, old new orleans rum, new orleans
Monday, July 28, 2008
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Home safe and sound from
Tales of the Cocktail, and I'm still nowhere near caught up in all of my writing...or my detox. It was a dizzyingly enjoyable trip that included a lot of different cocktails that are special to the city that calls itself "The Birthplace of the Cocktail". I sat in bars with bartenders, industry people, and fellow bloggers drinking Sazeracs, Absinthe Suisses, Vieux Carres, French 75's, and a littany of other fine drinks...and for this month's
Mixology Monday,
Paul Clarke has chosen to honor the New Orleans cocktail experience by naming New Orleans as the theme. You can catch the
round-up at the Cocktail Chronicles.
So many classic and fantastic cocktails to choose from, I spent some serious time debating which one should be my submission. Then I stumbled across this photo from Tales:
That's right. A collection of self-proclaimed cocktail snobs participating in the holy ritual of drinking Hurricanes at Pat O'Brien's on Bourbon Street. We didn't do it because we wanted to do it, we did it because people always say that when you're in NOLA, you HAVE to have a Hurricane at Patty-O's.
The Hurricane was invented at Pat O'Brien's during World War II. There was a shortage of whiskey and a gluttony of rum available for making drinks. So the industrious folks at Patty-O's came up with a drink that would allow them to sell drinks with rum in them. They served them in hurricane lamps, and a New Orleans tradition was born!
The only problem with this ritual is that the Hurricanes there are...well...horrid. They're sickly sweet (dare I use the blogger hot-word "cloying"?), spiritually weak, and just all-around bad. It's the nectar of the college tourist. The drink of the non-discriminating palate. I believe the scientific term is "swill" (on a side note, the good news on those drinks is that they ended up being free).
So my choice was made for me, I had to go storm chasing and make a great Hurricane.
I figured I'd start at the bottom and work my way up. So I went and looked up the recipe for Pat O'Brien's Hurricane on their very own website:
Pat O'Brien's Hurricane
4 oz Pat O'Brien's Hurricane Rum or a good dark rum
4 oz Pat O'Brien's Hurricane Mix
Mix ingredients in a 26 oz. hurricane glass, fill with curshed ice, garnish with an orange and a cherry.
Needless to say, this is a recipe I cannot recreate. I don't have any of the Patty-O's rum or hurricane mix - and I am not ashamed of this fact at all. "Proud" would be a better word.
Moving right along to recipes worth trying, I searched the Internet and various bar books to discover that whatever the Hurricane originally was, it has since been so tinkered with and abused that there doesn't seem to be a definitive recipe available. So I cracked open one of my "free with purchase" bar books that litter my countertop and located a recipe that seemed to have some promise.
Hurricane #1
1.5 oz Dark Rum
1 oz Light Rum
1.5 oz fresh orange juice
1 oz fresh lime juice
1oz pineapple juice
.5 oz passion fruit syrup
1 dash Angostura bitters
Combine ingredient in a shaker with ice, shake and strain into a glass with crushed ice. Garnish with a pineapple wedge and a lime wedge.
I still lack an ice crusher, so I did the best I could with a mallet-like device and a plastic bag full of ice. I mixed the ingredients and tried the drink. It was OK. It wasn't too sweet. It wasn't too sour. It wasn't too good. It was incredibly weak and nothing really stood out about it. It tasted like one of those Dole "Orange-Pineapple-Strawberry-Lemon-Mango-Bamboo" juice drinks you can buy in the grocery store.
Of course, looking at the proportions, it's rather obvious that the spirit in this isn't all that much. I should have probably read the top of the page on this recipe:
The original hurricane was superpotent, with double the rum.... If you wish to attempt the classic formula, do so at your own risk.
Oh. Right. We can't have anyone tasting their rum. What was I thinking?
No more fooling around. I went back and found Jeff Berry's recommended recipe for a Hurricane, which is both simple and potent.
Jeff "Beachbum" Berry's Hurricane
2 oz Dark Jamaican Rum
1 oz lemon juice
1 oz passion fruit syrup
Shake with ice, strain into a glass with crushed ice.
Simple. Elegant. Straight-forward. I mixed the drink and poured it into a new glass. The flavor profile is a universe away from the first recipe. The flavors are strong and the drink was rather tart. It may be that I had an extra-sour lemon, or that there's something "off" with my passion fruit syrup, but this drink was puckery.
I had a few sips and decided it needed just a minor tweak to balance the sour flavor. Luckily I had just been to Hi Time and purchased a bottle of Passoa Passion Fruit Liqueur, which seemed like it could very easily do the trick.
The liqueur is incredibly sweet, so you don't need a whole lot. Trayce had suggested that no drink really needed more than a cap-full, which is about a 1/4 ounce. I poured the liqueur in as a floater, and then stirred the drink a bit to mix it together a bit more.
This was better. The sour flavor was still prominent, but not lip-smackingly so.
Jeff "Beachbum" Berry's Hurricane (Modified)
2 oz Dark Jamaican Rum
1 oz lemon juice
1 oz passion fruit syrup
.25 oz passion fruit liqueur
Shake with ice, strain into a glass with crushed ice.
Check out previous Mixology Monday Entries!
Filed Under: rum, mxmo, new orleans