RUM’S FREE SPIRIT

Rum occupies a broad regulatory berth, allowing its makers wide choices and more chances to create sublime cigar partnerships

BY JACK BETTRIDGE

Most fine, brown spirits are sticklers for regulations. Single malts flow only from pot stills. Straight whiskeys need to be aged in new casks. Irish, Scotch, and Canadian whiskeys have to come from the countries they are named for. Cognac must be made in a certain part of France. And they all toe the line with other, even stricter rules. Except rum. Without a country, rum is the pirate of the sipping world, the free-to-be-you-and-me category. You can make it anywhere on the globe. And no one will tell you how to ferment, distill or age it. Predictably, lack of regulation results in some pretty wide swings in quality. And yet, that freedom has an upside. The rum world is quite capable of putting out exquisite examples that can rival all comers in…

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Cigar Aficionado (Digital) - 1 Issue, September/October 2023

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