Tag: SFRumFest

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San Francisco Rum Festival 2024 Recap

The San Francisco Rum Festival returned to SOMArts Cultural Center and filled the venue with rum producers from across the globe. Sunday of Labor Day Weekend meant that rum was flowing freely, especially during a sort of happy hour portion later in the day called DaiquiriMANIA where many of the vendors offered Daiquiri cocktails to allow attendees to sample the rum in a cocktail. This portion was accompanied by a DJ playing mostly 80s hits and was a good option when more “casual rum fans” enter the building. This was an interesting idea I hope they revisit, and I got a truly excellent Passion Fruit Vanilla Daiquiri made by Tiki Lindy at the Myrtle Bank Jamaica rum table.

 

Being an experienced rum drinker, I skipped a lot of the tables and focused on things new to me. I made a beeline to the Worthy Park table to taste their wonderful new Overproof expression, finding it to be a good middle ground option between market leader Wray Overproof and cult king Rum Fire. Speaking of overproof, Oakland’s Wright & Brown had several expressions and I found their unaged Overproof to be an excellent rum that shows this style of rum doesn’t always have to be Jamaican. I also finally got to taste El Dorado’s High Ester expression, a total flavor bomb that was right up my alley. Lemon Hart’s 151 has been reformulated and tastes great.

In terms of Industry news, it sounds like Rhum Barbancourt’s availability issues will be remedied in the coming months, perfect if you’ve looking for their amazing unaged Haitian Proof expression. Similarly, Saint Benevolence mentioned they’re made some improvements to their aging program that should see their amazing Aged Rum Clairin to be more available soon as well. Sadly, it doesn’t seem like the distribution situation for Diamond Reserve rums is going any better, which is too bad because they’re great cocktail rums.

I attended a couple of the educational sessions with Kate Perry and Arminder Randhawa. The first was a blind test of expressions from Perry’s La Maison & Vellier product line. These are mostly high end limited expressions from countries rare to find in America, such as Shakara rum from Thailand and various limited editions from Transcontinental Rum Line, and being not so familiar with the line I did poorly at guessing (I had a great time drinking great rum, though). A second session provided compare and contrast opportunities with rum samples comparing cane vs. molasses, still type, and aging type. This was super informative and I’d love to see this come back next year.

The patio featured a couple vendors plus Doc Parks and Julio Palacios serving some of Parks’ always amazing cocktails. This rum festival continues to be a highlight of the year and a great opportunity for anyone looking to learn more about rum.

Saint Benevolence
Julio and Doc
Lemon Hart Rum
Cheers from SF Rum Fest
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Rum Congress at SF Rum Fest

The education-oriented Rum Congress was added to the San Francisco Rum Festival this year, offering deep dives into everyone’s favorite spirit. Rum Fest is returning to SOMArts Cultural Center this year.

Most of the sessions were hosted by a rum brand, with flowing samples provided. Plus, Rums of Puerto Rico had a series of cocktails after each session that featured a variety of Puerto Rican rums. These ranged from simple spritzers to a delicious rum punch.

I presented a session with Rum Wonk Matt Pietrek called Rums of the Mai Tai – Secrets Revealed. This covered the evolution of rums in the Trader Vic’s Mai Tai, with deep dives on the original J. Wray & Nephew 17, the rums of the original Hawaiian Mai Tai, and the 1950s era Martinique rhum. We had a receptive audience that asked detailed follow-up questions, and the Rum Fest staff had a great visual setup for slides. Thanks to Sam for the photos.

Other sessions included Pietrek and Alexander Gabriele discussing some details of Navy Rum and the new Planteray Mister Fogg rum, then both signed copies of their new book on the subject. Gabriele also presented a session about the West Indies Rum Distillery in Barbados. Rum Champion Bryan Inman led a session about French rhum including reps and samples from Rhum Barbancourt. The last session was very loose but still enjoyable as Rum Lab’s Fede Hernandez led a session talking about Puerto Rican rums in tiki cocktails.

This was supposed to be my “dry” day at Rum Fest but it was anything but. It sounds like the team is interested in trying to make Rum Congress an ongoing component of the event. If this kind of event appeals to you, leave a comment with what kind of sessions you’d like to see in the future.

Matt Pietrek and Alexandre Gabriel
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San Francisco Rum Festival and Congress Presentation

Coming on August 31, I’ll be presenting at the San Francisco Rum Festival and Congress alongside Matt Pietrek of RumWonk.com and CocktailWonk.com fame. Our seminar covers rums of the Mai Tai, including some historical details rarely seen or discussed.

Rums of the Mai Tai – Secrets Revealed

Few cocktails highlight rum better than the Mai Tai, the king of tiki cocktails and created by Trader Vic 80 years ago. Join Kevin Crossman and Matt Pietrek for a look at the evolution of the rums used in the Mai Tai through the decades, including deep dives into historic rum expressions.

“NOTE: These sessions are restricted to Rum Congress (Aug 31st) ticket holders and require an additional $ to attend. Very Limited seats available – ORDER HERE“

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SF Rum Fest Recap: Social Scene

I enjoy the seminars at San Francisco Rum Fest, if only that it helps to take a break from all the drinking. I didn’t find the seminars this time to be as interesting as year’s past (I also had to leave the event a little early, so missed the last two sessions I was interested in). Hope next year is better.

I did enjoy the session led by Cocktail Wonk Matt Pietrek regarding the work that WIRSPA is doing to build strength among Caribbean rum producers. Matt also gave me some details about his next super-secret product that I’m sure will be amazing. Shhhhh.

So many familiar faces from the industry and the fan side. Thanks to Cory Schoolland for being my line buddy when I got to the event early. We met up with master mixologist Nathan Robinson who is a frequent contributor to the FB groups where Cory and I participate.

There were a few tiki vendors once again this year. It’s always great to see Match Accessories who Mrs. Mai Tai buys from frequently. I just don’t know how much a couple vendors adds to the event, especially at the Hibernia Bank location that lacks an outdoor patio like the previous event space for past Rum Fests. The crowd always seems more interested in drinking, anyway.

The Hibernia Bank is a good location for this event, though. Nice and cool inside, even on a super hot weekend in SF. A good layout with high ceilings and an adequately sized seminar room.

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SF Rum Fest Recap: The Rums

Had a great time in the city for this annual Rum Fest, this time being billed as the San Francisco Rum Fest now that there’s a companion new event in Los Angeles.

This is an event that’s mix of educational seminars, rum education, rum exploration, and social meetup. Having tasted more of these rums over the years, I lean more into the social side but there’s always some new brands or expressions to try. View the video of the layout.

I was impressed by the single-still releases from El Dorado: Enmore, Versailles, and Port Mourant. These are all aged 12 years and provided at cask strength. I was told these would retail at ~$90, in which case that would be a steal. I do see them offered online for ~$150 which seems to be more what I’d expect. In any case, these are flavor bombs that are so great. I was most impressed by the Versailles, with the Port Mourant being a close second.

Diamond Distilleries was also showing off a fruity and light white 151, aged six months. And a heavier dark 151 aged two years, somewhat more reminiscent of the famed LH151 but still quite lighter.

Rhum Barbancourt had a white expression I’d never tried before and liked. It’s a lighter style than the Haitian rum clairin from Saint Benevolence, which has an aged expression in the market and more things to come.

Copalli rum from Belize seems to be everywhere. I liked both the white and the barrel rested expressions. They were serving a great daiquiri riff by local bartender Maritza Rocha-Alvarez that was superb.

Rhum Saint James from Martinique seemed to be making a push to get better distribution and had a number of new and interesting expressions.

I spoke to the Hawaiian producers about their product, which will be covered in a deeper dive in a couple weeks.

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Call for Mai Tai Riff Recipes

It was great to run into the Chris Sinclair and Drew Garrison from the Good Bottle Podcast at the California Rum Fest a couple days ago. Their latest episode covers the festival in detail, including rum brands on the rise and new expressions to seek out. They also cover the top selling rum brands and the results may surprise you.

The episode ended with a little Mai Tai discussion, and a shoutout to our little corner of the internet on their “Dope Follows” segment (mahalo!).

Listen and Download
The Good Bottle Podcast: The Gang Does Rum-Fest

Mai Tai Riffs Wanted

Chris and Drew are looking to an upcoming episode featuring riffs on the Mai Tai recipe, which they’ve invited me to help discuss and judge. I’m totally down for that.

Send your recipe suggestions to: thegoodbottlepodcast@gmail.com

 

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California Rum Fest Recap

It was so nice to get out and see friends and to talk about rum at the California Rum Fest. Of course it is always nice to see locals, but even nicer when you can catch up with people who traveled to the event.

Big shout out to Will Hoekenga from The Rum Cast. I did their podcast a few months ago and it is still one of the highlights of the year. Will was involved with the event and did a live stream on Zavvy. Check out their online events with rum and other spirits producers. Will also writes the American Rum Report and hosted a seminar on American rums yesterday.

And so nice to see Cory Schoolland who participated in our 5 Bottle Rum Challenge earlier this year. Cory recently launched a Bad Mai Tais group on Facebook which serves to educate others on how NOT to make a Mai Tai.