Cocktail Wonk Top Ten Stories of 2021

Welcome to my traditional year-end introspective for CocktailWonk.com, my free-form writing outlet.

Viewed solely by frequency of stories, 2021 was my slowest since starting in 2013. But by totaling up my output across all my projects (not just Cocktail Wonk), 2021 was a gangbuster year. Cocktail Wonk took a backseat role for my time allocation, but the payoff will be worth it. Stay tuned.

While stories here appeared less frequently, they continued taking the road less traveled in the service of:

• Revealing previously uncovered topics and surprises
• Telling the real history of rum via original sources, even when differing from a brand’s version
• Setting the record straight on common misperceptions

Tasting notes, side-by-side comparisons, and pontifications on the latest hotness are no longer my jam.

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What follows are two Top Ten Lists:

• Stories written in 2021 providing deep content that will (hopefully) stand the test of time
• Top-ranked stories by page view count

Top Ten Stories – Deep Content

Independent of pages views, these are the stories I would point new readers to as examples of what Cocktail Wonk is about. They’re roughly in order of importance, based solely on my own opinion.

#1 – Tiki’s Missing Ingredient: “Martinique Rum” of Yore

This story combines my affection for rum education, history, and tiki into a tale of “We’ve been doing it wrong.” All those folks making classic Tiki recipes of the golden era with rhum agricole may wish to read and reconsider.

#2 – Navy Rum Strength isn’t 57%

There is an aphorism – Repeat a lie often enough, and it becomes the “truth.” When it comes to “navy strength” rums, it’s an uphill battle against brands that either don’t know or don’t care that they’re misrepresenting history.

#3 – Six Things About the French Rum Industry

The French rum market is full of buried surprises. Did you know that French departments such as Martinique collectively make far more molasses-based rum than agricole? Or that one little-known company dominates Frances’s rum production? Or that nearly all French rum makers operate under quotas? This one is for the super-wonks.

#4 – Gatekeeping the Mai Tai

The tiki community is frequently roiled when someone calls out a recipe as inauthentic. Are they just jerks or Defenders of the Faith? Drawing on the Mai Tai’s history and the inception of the tiki revival, I reach a surprising conclusion.

#5 – Demerara Rum GI Achieves EU Recognition

Each additional rum GI (geographical indication) is another body blow to the “Rum has no rules” ridiculousness. An exclusive first look at what Guyana chose as the requirements to be called Demerara Rum.

#6 – Demerara Distillers Heritage Stills: A Deep Q&A with Shaun Caleb

The esoteric details of Demerara Distillers’ heritage stills are of intense interest to the rum Illuminati. Here I collected and posed an uber-geeky set of questions to DDL’s master distiller, Shaun Caleb.

#7 – Martinique’s Other Rum Regulation: The Grand Arôme (Le Galion) PGI

While Martinique’s AOC regulations are widely known, far fewer people know about Grand arôme; Martinique’s version of “high ester” rum. Or that it has its own GI.

#8 – Rethinking “White Rum”

Rum is like cheese – the color conveys nothing meaningful about it. In this article, I propose more common sense categories to replace “white rum,” e.g., “multi-country blend,” “unaged Jamaican overproof,” and “Aged and filtered.” The story also has a reference guide mapping many popular “white rums” to these categories,

#9 – Barbados Rum: Ten Things to Know

Prompted by so much interest in Barbadian rum from new enthusiasts, I painted an overview of Barbados rum in bite-size chunks, including some important yet overlooked perspectives. I’d not written in this format before and was pleasantly surprised by the response.

#10 – Ten Things to Know About Jamaican Rum

Given the success of the Barbados Top Ten, Jamaica was an obvious successor. As before, the list has its share of often surprises and historical tidbits.

Top Ten by Page Views

Unlike the prior list, this list includes all content on CocktailWonk.com, regardless of when written.

No huge surprises here. People favored tiki content, then rum deep dives. The only story written in 2021 was the Barbados Rum Cheat Sheet. I deliberately didn’t deep dive on that topic, and folks seemed to respond to bite-size nuggets of information.

• Minimalist Tiki: What you truly need to make classic Tiki Cocktails
• The Six Essential Tiki Rum Categories
• Rum is made from Sugar; So are Bourbon, Vodka & Tequila
• Bourbon vs. Rum: Technical Head to Head
• Rum and Cane Spirits Articles
• Jamaican Rum Marques Roundup
• Navigating Smuggler’s Cove: Exotic Cocktails, Rum, and the Cult of Tiki
• Days of Dunder: Jamaican Rum’s Mystery Ingredient
• Stop Setting Your Rum on Fire! Tiki Fire Explained
• Barbados Rum Cheat Sheet

That’s it for 2021! It’s my fervent hope to push out more stories in 2022, as I have lots to share!