Rum, Rum, Rum
For a long time, rum had been associated with stories about pirates, smugglers, sailors and ships that secretly unloaded rum barrels in the British coasts.

It took little time to discover the strong and fervent liquor that could be obtained from sugar cane. Around the 1640’s, there were in Barbados the first distilled liquors of the islands. In 1657, the English refugee Richard Ligon, in his book The true history of the island of Barbados, mentions a beverage, which he called “devil killer” so strong that was almost impossible to drink. Those who did, quickly notice the effects.

Some times, drinking rum ended in rumbullion, an ancient English word for a noisy quarrel, and the origin of the word rum. Another of the first visitors of Barbados wrote: “In this island people get drunk with rumbullion, also known as “devil killer”, This drink is obtained from the distilled sugar cane, and is a very strong, demonic and terrific liquor”.

Rum is elaborated with molasses, a black and thick liquid that is a remainder of sugar production. Then spring water is added (in Barbados it filtrates through a coral rock), and rests for fermentation. After distillation, more fresh water is added to what is already a colorless liquid, with an alcohol percentage of almost 95°, and is left to grow old in oak barrels. The best rum should rest, at least, seven years. The golden color is the work of the master making the mixture, and the ingredients used. Rum stays colorless if it is preserved for a little time, in steel barrels.

Most of the island’s have trademarks and rum factories of their own. For example, Barbados, the cradle of this drink, has the Mount Gay and the Cockspur; Trinidad has the Old Oak and Vat 19, and Martinique has the Trois Rivières and St. Clement.

Rum was included in the daily ration received by the soldiers of the British Royal Navy. It was a very important drink for them, because it kept them lively to tolerate long trips through stormy seas. That is why, in 1731, they resented an order from Admiral Vernon, forcing them to dilute the rum in water. This Admiral used to dress with a mantle made from grogram, so their men nicknamed him as “Old Grog”. This is the origin of the name of that beverage called grog (made of hot sugar water mixed with rum, an a lemon disk).

From then on, rum has been mixed with a wide range of juices and beverages, producing wonderful cocktails and punches you can enjoy at the beach’s bars, next to the pools and in balconies all around the Caribbean. The word punch came from India, another of the old British colonies, where panch means five, because five are the basic ingredients of this beverage: “first, something acid (lima juice), second, something sweet (sugar syrup), third, a strong drink (rum), fourth, a soft drink (water), fifth, something bitter (some drops of angostura and a bit of nutmeg), served cold and with ice”.

At the rum shops in Trinidad and Barbados, for example, they drink it with ice. But a rum shop is much more than a bar; is a place of gathering for the community, where passionate domino games are played, and people talk about politics, and happy moments are celebrated. These shops are still exclusively, men’s territory. As an old Caribbean sentence says: “Men at the rum shop, and women at the church”. Even British poet Lord Byron, must thought something similar when he wrote: “There’s nothing better to calm down spirit/ like true religion and a rum drink”.