Elements
Eight Republica sees the UK based rum company move away from the island of St Lucia for the first time. Since launching in 2006 Elements Eight have focused on a range of rums solely from St Lucia Distillers. Following a re-launch and re-design of the rums range in 2016 Carl Stephenson, the founder of Elements Eight began thinking about releasing rums from other countries/regions.
Tag Archives: Panama
Another independent release from Berrys’ Bros and Rudd. This time they have bottled a Latin style rum from Panama.
Perhaps the best known rum brand from Panama is Ron Abuelo. Until recently you could argue that one of Don Pancho’s many blends – Ron de Jeremy Reserva was better known/ more infamous. That rum is no longer from Panama – it is now a Caribbean blend.
Rum Nation are an Italian Independent bottler headed up by Fabio Rossi. It was formed in 1999 and has the tagline Single Domaine Rum.
In keeping with many Independent bottlers Rum Nation do not give specific information on the distillery and or still. In most instances you just get the country of origin.
Another try out with a Mezan rum. At these prices it would simply have been rude not to give Mezan a fair crack of the whip. With Mezan trying to do things the “right way” (in many peoples eyes – including their own) I simply had to persevere with their range.
This Panama 1999 is another one of my more unusual purchases. The original idea was to finally try one of Francisco “Don Pancho” Fernandez’s rums. I’d focused on the reasonably priced 7 year old celebrity cash in Ron De Jeremy. Then I saw this Mezan distilled in 1999 and bottled between 2012 and 2014 (I have only seen that around on the net so it may well be wrong I cannot find a definitive age).
Ron Espero – which roughly translates to “Rum of Hope” hails from the Dominican Republic and is bottled in Panama. They have a fairly uninspiring English language website and the rum is imported into Europe by Haromex Development GmbH.
The website has only been going since 2013. I’ve no doubt they’ve been producing rum for longer than that. I think that this may well be the first English language review of any of their rums. Online the rum seems to be getting widely ignored.
After noticing the “Ron De Jeremy” Panamanian rum whilst browsing on Amazon, I felt the need to try a Panamanian rum. There are only so many Bajan, Jamaican or Demerara rums you can try before you think they all taste fairly similar and you aren’t really getting anything different for your money.