Age statements

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Count Silvio
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Thu Dec 27, 2007 9:36 pm

Recently on another forum there has been talk about the numbers on rum bottle labels, specifically Ron Zacapa Centenario 23 años, and how they can be misleading. There has also been some conversation about this at Ministry of Rum as some of you know.

It was suggested that on the label there should be the age of the youngest rum used in the blend, if it is a blend of different aged rums like Zacapa is. I suggested it would be better if it was taken as a standard that solera blenders like Zacapa had a mark on the label saying "solera blender" like the mark on Ron Matusalems label.

I would like to know what rules you think should be set for the rum industry when placing numbers on their labels and why?
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Sun Dec 30, 2007 12:16 pm

To me it seems very simple. If it's a blend mark it as such on the front. Note the ages (and percentages) of the blends on the back label.

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AngelSword
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Sun Dec 30, 2007 5:41 pm

Count Silvio wrote:Recently on another forum there has been talk about the numbers on rum bottle labels, specifically Ron Zacapa Centenario 23 años, and how they can be misleading. There has also been some conversation about this at Ministry of Rum as some of you know.

It was suggested that on the label there should be the age of the youngest rum used in the blend, if it is a blend of different aged rums like Zacapa is. I suggested it would be better if it was taken as a standard that solera blenders like Zacapa had a mark on the label saying "solera blender" like the mark on Ron Matusalems label.

I would like to know what rules you think should be set for the rum industry when placing numbers on their labels and why?
Is Zacapa a solera blender? If so then their 23 yr age statement could lead to legal problems for them if anyone chose to challenge it.

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Sun Dec 30, 2007 7:19 pm

To my knowledge it is. The average age or the oldest rum in the blend is 23 years old.
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Scottes
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Mon Dec 31, 2007 2:22 pm

I have tendencies to doubt that rum makers will start marking the ages on their bottles.

And it really doesn't mean much for rum. In a place like Scotland or Kentucky the age differences can be compared and be comparable due to the tight geographic location. For rum, the geographic location is too widespread. From Massachusetts to Venezuela and over to India and Nepal. And the elevation ranges from sea level to 7600 feet. The temperature and humidity swings are far too broad to be compared. So the age statements would mean little unless comparing 2 rums from a close group of islands. One can't even say "country" because here in the US we have rum made in Massachusetts to California.

To add to this are the wide range of barrels used. Rum is not bourbon, which tightly requires new white oak barrels. Who the heck knows what barrels are used in rum aging, and what they have been used for in the past?

An aging statement for rum is just about useless, in my opinion. It might give you some idea of where a rum might be when comparing wide-spread age statements. I'd be more apt to try a 10-year-old before a 4-year-old, for instance. But to think that a 10-year-old will be better than an 8-year-old is kinda silly. Drink what you like.


As for blending, you can pretty much be assured that ALL rum is blended. Even Cruzan Single Barrel is blended, although the name might make one think that it's not. Heck, aren't most single malts a blend? "Single-malt (unblended) Scotch is malt Scotch that's produced and bottled by a single distillery without being blended with other Scotch whiskys." I'm sure that the whiskys in a batch are blended in *some* way. There's simply no way that any single malt could retain the same taste over the years without blending. Same goes for rum.

Again, I say "Drink what you like."


As for the RZ23, the Solera system is a bit tricky. The fact that they say the average age is 23 years is probably not all that accurate. And it would depend on some fancy calculations in a marketing sense. If I took a barrel of 1-year-old rum and added a drop of 46-year-old rum, who says that I couldn't say that the average age of the rums was 23 years? (Not that I'm implying that Zacapa does this.) But Solera is tricky, and marketing folks are much, much trickier.

The RZ23 is fantastic. I drink it. Why? Because I drink what I like. :-)

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Mon Dec 31, 2007 2:39 pm

Scottes wrote:To add to this are the wide range of barrels used. Rum is not bourbon, which tightly requires new white oak barrels. Who the heck knows what barrels are used in rum aging, and what they have been used for in the past?
Apparently some rums are aged in huge vats instead of barrels.

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Mon Dec 31, 2007 4:10 pm

Scottes wrote:Heck, aren't most single malts a blend? "Single-malt (unblended) Scotch is malt Scotch that's produced and bottled by a single distillery without being blended with other Scotch whiskys." I'm sure that the whiskys in a batch are blended in *some* way. There's simply no way that any single malt could retain the same taste over the years without blending. Same goes for rum.
I think the term single-malt refers not so much to the single distillery but to one type of malted grain.
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Mon Dec 31, 2007 4:25 pm

I defer to you in matters of Scotch. But I've always understood is to be a combination of both - since 2 different distilleries would certainly be a blend...

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Mon Dec 31, 2007 4:27 pm

AngelSword wrote:Apparently some rums are aged in huge vats instead of barrels.
Is "aging" a good term for this? I've always heard this process as either "resting" or when blending, "marrying."

I have a hard time believing that a huge vat would have much effect as an aging process, since the wood-to-rum ration would be quite low. Some producers, like Prichard's, intentionally use small barrels to increase the wood-to-rum ratio to get "more aging" in a shorter time.

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Tue Jan 01, 2008 5:54 pm

Count Silvio wrote: I think the term single-malt refers not so much to the single distillery but to one type of malted grain.
It refers to single distillery.

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Tue Jan 01, 2008 6:04 pm

But not to malted grain?
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Tue Jan 01, 2008 6:21 pm

Single Malt indeed is from a single distillery and made entirely from malted barley.

Vatted Malt is a blend of Single Malts.

Blended Scotch is a combination of Malt and neutral grain Whiskys.
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Fri Jan 04, 2008 4:43 am

When many distilleries sell an entire cask they will pour in a bottle from another distillery so that it is no longer a single malt.

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Sat Jan 05, 2008 11:06 pm

May you enlighten us as to the reasoning for this practice?


AngelSword wrote:When many distilleries sell an entire cask they will pour in a bottle from another distillery so that it is no longer a single malt.
Let Debrett's Peerage be your guide

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Sat Jan 05, 2008 11:33 pm

Solera is tricky indeed. One does not know if they are following the Spanish and Madhirean traditions. In a solera the blender is acheiving a mark by fractional blending. How much he "pushes" the the solera by drawing from it year to year directly affects quality. RZ 23 may have been started 23 years ago.. Depending on how much they pushed through the solera there might be precious little of the original left.


Scottes wrote: RZ23, the Solera system is a bit tricky. The fact that they say the average age is 23 years is probably not all that accurate. And it would depend on some fancy calculations in a marketing sense. If I took a barrel of 1-year-old rum and added a drop of 46-year-old rum, who says that I couldn't say that the average age of the rums was 23 years? (Not that I'm implying that Zacapa does this.) But Solera is tricky, and marketing folks are much, much trickier.

The RZ23 is fantastic. I drink it. Why? Because I drink what I like. :-)
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Tue Jan 08, 2008 12:37 pm

I got caught by the editor of Harpers - an international wine and spirits magazine - into discussing this topic. Caused quite a stir but at least I retracted some of my comments cause I was naming loads of names (New Cockspur 12 year old with the oldest rum in the blend 12 years, Appleton VX with 2 year old rum in the mix???). Must guard my tongue when on the rum, eh?

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Sun Aug 24, 2008 11:49 am

Rum Runner wrote:May you enlighten us as to the reasoning for this practice?
AngelSword wrote:When many distilleries sell an entire cask they will pour in a bottle from another distillery so that it is no longer a single malt.
This practice insures that the cask is sold as a blend, vatted, or pure malt... rather than a single malt.

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Sun Aug 24, 2008 12:24 pm

One of the rare exceptions is the amazing Richard Seale. He stands rightfully proud on the facts that his rums are made with the highest possible integrity - no additives or flavoring whatever. He makes clear that every single drop of rum in his bottles are at least the age stated. He is an impressive and honest man, a great talent and leader in his industry, dedicated to both top quality and integrity. Although he does not stand, or sit alone, it's a mightly small table.

Unlike most of the rest of the pirates.
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Sun Aug 24, 2008 8:57 pm

Despite of the differences in conditions in ageing rum at different countries and places, I do feel it would bring a degree of intergrity to the whole rum industry if producers everywhere adopted a uniformal approach to age statements - and my suggestion would then be that the age of the youngest distillate put into the bottle would be marked as the official age.

Should the manufacturer wish to add more information to the data on the bottle in the style of saying for example "the youngest distillate used in blending this fine rum is, as stated on the label, 8 years old, but we have also used several casks containing rum as old as 24 years in creating this blend", I see no harm in it. Or optionally saying for example that "As we age our rums in very hot tropical climate, it is estimated that a rum aged in these conditions for 8 years matches approximately an ageing process of 23 years in a cool climate". Such additional information would be interesting to read.

On the other hand the rum industry is a complex beast in many more ways: Never mind that the age statement of a rum might not tell us much. Well, never mind that all the rum in a particular bottle would come from a single distillery - In the age of bulk rum, quite often it is not even clear what multiple countries the rum blended into a bottle came from! This is rather unheard of in Whisky or Brandy circles at least so far.

Similarly many blender companies are actually not distilling any of their "own" rum, only blending what others produce - and this produce could be a mixture of Trinidad/Guyana/Jamaica/ whatever. Blender's art is a much respected one in the world of rum, and because rum is made in so many countries, often the blends contain distillated from many countries as well.

At the end of the day, does it all matter? Yes and no, I feel. I personally find single distillery products often more interesting that more obscure labels of "whatever" mixed, at least as long as the single distillery products are of good taste and quality. Rums that can be identified as a produce of one single country/location are of more interest to me than those compiled of amultitude of origins. But it is difficult to be 100% certain of a rums' origin in this world...

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Tue Sep 16, 2008 8:37 pm

By the way it should be now noted that Ron Zacapa Centenario is no longer Ron Zacapa Centenario 23 Años but Ron Zacapa Centenario 23 (without the años) as noted in the new packaging and label: http://www.refinedvices.com/forum_/view ... ?f=4&t=174
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Wed Sep 17, 2008 11:01 am

Bear in mind - an agreement on age statements is already in effect within the largest confederation - WIRSPA (West Indian Rum and Spirit Producers Association). These definitions are also mainly in line with EEC definitions.

All rum producers within the 15 WIRSPA member countries conform to;

Minimum age statements used on bottles (if at all)
Not distilled to more than 96% abv
No additives other than caramel to be added
Bottled at no less than 37.5% abv
Minimum aged 1 year

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