Rum was the topic for the Worshipful Company of Distillers, 2024 lecture, and we were very privileged to have Bacardi deliver the presentation.
Dickie Cullimore, Global Brand Ambassador for Bacardi Rums, joined us in the room and Astrophel “Troy” Arquiza, Bacardi Global Master Rum Blender, joined us on Teams from Jacksonville, which was even more remarkable as Hurricane Milton had just passed through Florida and it was touch and go if he would have a working internet connection.
To start with we were given some of the of the impressive Bacardi backstory from the insight of the founder Don Facundo Bacardi Masso, the early days in Cuba then the move to the current Bacardi rum distillery in Puerto Rico.
The students were then taken through the process with Dickie setting the scene and Troy providing the technical detail when required. We discovered that Bacardi rum has a unique yeast strain that has been used since the beginning, the importance of cask selection in maturation and the role charcoal plays in shaping the final products.
The discussion on the process was taken up a level when Dickie produced a couple of aces in the form of two separate distillates from the Puerto Rico distillery. The first was aguardiente, literally fire water in Spanish, the second, redestillado a smoother lighter tasting spirit. The former provides body and depth to the rums with the latter more refined and being used to balance the aguardiente. To produce the final rums the Master Blenders will mix these spirits from different ages and cask types to create the final Bacardi Rums.
Like all spirit drinks, sustainability now plays an important role in the production process and Dickie shared some examples such as the work done in converting to Biogas from fuel oil and the work being done to reduce the water usage. There was some novel work being trialled on purifying sea water without using the traditional energy intensive processes.
All in all a fascinating insight into the production process and although Troy had to leave us at this point, the night was far from over.
We moved into the bar area where in a more relaxed environment Dickie conducted a tutored tasting of some fabulous Bacardi Rums, Bacardi 8, Bacardi 10 and to finish a recent addition to the Bacardi portfolio, Bacardi Reserva Ocho Sevillian Orange Cask Finish. The questions were now coming thick and fast with Dickie doing his best to answer as many as he could.
There were a lot of smiling faces by the end of the evening, and while it may have had something to do with the wonderful rums we tasted, it was clear to me that the knowledge and professional approach of Dickie and Troy really made the difference and led to a wonderful evening.
On behalf of the Worshipful Company of Distillers, I’d like to put on record our thanks to Bacardi, in particular Dickie, Troy and Sorcha Gall (supporting Dickie). I’d also like to thank our military affiliate 603 Squadron for lending us the use of their HQ for the evening.
