Rum is made everywhere in the world, and nice locations to get pleasure from it are equally scattered among the many 4 factors of the compass.
SMUGGLER’S COVE—San Francisco, California
When Martin Cate and his spouse, Rebecca, opened Smuggler’s Cove in 2009, they featured some 200 rums. At this time, they’ve bought 850. Critical explorers be part of the bar’s Rumbustion Society, which affords on-line and IRL training on a variety of rum types— a number of members have sampled greater than 1,000 rums. “After I created the membership, my dream was to create educated customers,” Cate says. He’s carried out that and then some.
RUMBA—Seattle, Washington
Rumba is discovered on the intersection of neighborhood joint and rum-nerd vacation spot bar. It’s bought a casual and unpretentious vibe, paired with a deep rum listing. (It’s nicely represented with Jamaican rums for these in stressed search of funk.) Rum drinks vary from the classics—5 varieties of Daiquiri; a number of variations on punch—to quirky fashionable variations, akin to A Rum With a Vieux. However the cocktails by no means sail thus far into unfamiliar waters that you would be able to’t see the port from which you embarked.
BEACHBUM BERRY’S LATITUDE 29—New Orleans, Louisiana
Latitude 29 is a tiki drinks library come to life. It’s overseen with curatorial aplomb by Jeff “Beachbum” Berry, who’s rightly credited with single-handedly fueling the tiki revival via his rediscovery of misplaced recipes for classics such because the Zombie and Nui-Nui. In 2014, he and spouse, Annene Kaye, opened Latitude 29 within the French Quarter, permitting visitors to advance their tropical drinks training, one sip at a time.
TRAILER HAPPINESS—London, United Kingdom
This Portobello Street bar has been serving traditional and authentic tropical drinks since 2003, and underneath the possession of Sly Augustin, it’s additionally helped unfold the rum phrase via Notting Hill and past. A décor of midcentury California kitsch creates a relaxed vibe, whereas a deep dive into the tailor-made rum choice exhibits how severe a celebration bar may be.
BABA AU RUM—Athens, Greece
Whether or not you’re on the lookout for a traditional Mai Tai, a bespoke cocktail just like the Bahama Baba (with three varieties of rum, cold-brew espresso, orange, pineapple, and coconut), or merely a neat pour of one thing beautiful from Barbados, Cuba, or Martinique, this rum bar in downtown Athens (additionally a pioneer within the Greek cocktail revival) has you lined.
RUM CLUB—Portland, Oregon
Nice rum bars are alleged to be enjoyable, a little rollicking, and—duh—filled with bottles of rum. Since 2011, Rum Membership has succeeded on all counts, its informal vibe and rum cocktails just like the Pedro Martinez and absinthe-accented Rum Membership Daiquiri drawing each a dedicated workforce of regulars in addition to a daily procession of out-of-town rum followers stopping by to examine out the bottle listing.
AGUARDIENTE—Marina di Ravenna, Italy
Contemplating the spirit’s Caribbean provenance, rum and rum bars have a pure affinity for the ocean—however within the case of Aguardiente, in Italy’s Emilia-Romagna area, that maritime breeze is blowing in off the Adriatic. Over the previous 4 years, proprietor Jimmy Bertazolli has developed one of many deepest rum alternatives in Europe, with extra than 1,000 bottles of sugarcane spirits, served alongside bespoke cocktails and Caribbean requirements like Wray & Ting.
THE LOBO—Sydney, Australia
With greater than 250 rums in its choice and a deep menu of tropical drinks, The Lobo (which lately modified its identify from The Lobo Plantation) is rum’s chief ambassador to the antipodes. On this subterranean area in Sydney’s Central Enterprise District, spirits from the Caribbean and Central and South America populate the cabinets together with rums from Australian distillers, and the bar’s classic rum assortment stretches again to the Nineteen Thirties.
EL FLORIDITA—Havana, Cuba
Located within the Cuban capital since 1817, Floridita isn’t a lot an incredible rum bar (its choice is admittedly modest) because it is a superb rum cocktail bar. A variety of traditional rum cocktails hint their origins and fame to this nook spot in Habana Vieja, and its red-jacketed cantineros proceed to combine Daiquiris (and their variations) by the lots of every day, earlier than the gaze of the bronze statue of Ernest Hemingway (a longtime common) that occupies a spot on the finish of the bar.
JUNGLE BIRD—Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Billing itself as a “rumah rum” (house for rum) within the Bukit Damansara neighborhood, Jungle Chook brings the spirit of the tropics to … nicely, the tropics. Rainforest prints and rattan furnishings kind a lush setting for sipping cocktails, such because the Koeniggi-Roni (rhum agricole, Campari, dry vermouth, and curry leaf) or the Thunder Thunder (Haitian clairin, Venezuelan rum, Hakka lei cha [ground tea mixture], sesame orgeat, and Thai basil).
