...noble. This all started quite some years ago when the self-serving Prophet, the Preacher, entitled his commercial website with the phrase "Rum... the noble spirit!". Back then, many of us were relative dummies, or in my case an idiot and bought into that lie until many bottles later, most of us came to know the truth of rogue rum and its unlabeled additives, coloring, glycerol, sugar, wine, artificial flavors and the like.
Fortunately the word got out and today, few indeed are buying that load of moose droppings. Until this month when my friend Luis Ayala in his monthly "Got Rum" e-magazine, issue for now, November 2014:
http://www.gotrum.com/downloads/718/dow ... er2014.pdf
Now let it be known that I respect Luis whose seminal work well preceeded that of the Preacher, and who self-published a lovely 8-1/2 x 11 book called "The Rum Experience". Luis is well aware of the defamation of rum; in our private communications - like the Count - he is fully supportive of our work against the unlabelled alteration of rum. But also like the Count, due to his rum consulting and promoting work, he too fails to publicly walk the walk, as should be perfectly evident from this nutty article."Merriam-Webster’s dictionary defines nobility as: “Noun: the quality or state of being noble in character or quality.” some of its synonyms are: virtue, goodness, honor, decency, integrity; magnanimity, generosity and selflessness
Rum has often been referred to as “The noble spirit.”
It is unclear who coined the term, but it has been around for centuries. But why is it, a noble spirit?
Are there other distillates that can also be considered noble? It is my view that only spirits distilled from fruits and plants with high natural levels of sucrose (like sugarcane) can be considered “ noble,” since their sugars are readily fermentable. Grain, potato and agave spirits, for example, must undergo a starch conversion process before there are simple sugars that can be fermented by yeast."
I need not argue that rum is anything but a noble spirit, which title is unequivocally owned by wine based on a selected number of "noble grapes". As a fun comparison though, I thought a simple test of Ayala's ridiculous claim would be a simple search engine comparison, searching for "noble wine", then "noble whiskey", et al.
The results, number of returns:
Whisk(e)y: 5,550,000
Wine: 3,860,000
Grape: 1,880,000
Rum: 1,220,000
Vodka: 732,000
Cognac: 330,000
Needless to say, with the exception of "noble grapes", the descriptor "noble" is really more of a marketing word. I have written Luis regarding his novel theory that noble spirits refers to spirits made from self-fermenting fruits high in natural sucrose (that don't require malting).
*******
http://www.gotrum.com/downloads/718/dow ... er2014.pdf
