BJ: Shillery aglow about Tanduay Rum

[Capn Jimbo]

"Excellent flavor... great rum! Medium bodied, nice complexities... Even the Pope has a bottle, so it must be heavenly stuff indeed."


Pretty heady stuff. Even the Preacher urged the monkeys "...it's definitely worth trying if you can find it". I hope the Pope takes notice! On a three page thread only one lone monkey is a bit skeptical...

MRJ: "Very soft & smooth light style rum, light gold in colour. In my opinion far better a product than the Tanduay 12yo, which has a slightly chemical and oddly artificial flavour profile (even the colur of it is strangely orange in hue). (emphasis added)"

Please note that MRJ (of whom I know) was then "liberated" from the Shillery. Dissent is simply not allowed at the "...it's all good" corral. Enough. It's time for the facts.

The Tanduay website is amazing!

“ALCOHOL. The most important ingredient in rhum is distilled alcohol. Tanduay’s main supplier of distilled alcohol is Asian Alcohol, which provides 70% of the total requirement, while the remaining 30% comes from other local and foreign suppliers. Raw Alcohol is transported to the plant by tanker. Within the plant, the alcohol is blended together with demineralized water, sugar and other ingredients.”

Apparently Tanduay doesn’t even distill their own spirit, and depends on adding “sugar and other ingredients” to achieve their profiles. And...

“VARIOUS INGREDIENTS. Various ingredients and flavoring agents are used in the production of rum. The main distributor is International Flavors, which supplies 75% of the company’s requirements.”

It's really worse. Tanduay sees "rum" as just a name, and their strange product is simply a recipe of purchased alcohol, sugar, and other flavorings. They simply assemble what they want to pass off and label as "rum". Good god!

And how about that labeling? These clearly flavored concoctions are all labeled "rum". And their "8 year old" product is described on their site as being composed of a blend of rums "as old as" eight years! Simply, the "8 years" refers not to the youngest, but to the oldest rum in the blend.

Disheartening. Would I drink this "chemical, oddly flavored, strangely orange, age-deceptive" shit? Never. But it's a huge hit at the Shillery...

[Capn Jimbo]

Tanduay: Assemblers of Fine Rum


To sharpen the discussion, we should really consider why I consider Tanduay the poster boy for what's wrong in the wacky world of rum. First, let's consider what Tanduay calls the "rum" they make, from their website...

Tanduay:

• ALCOHOL. The most important ingredient in rhum is distilled alcohol. Tanduay's main supplier of distilled alcohol is Asian Alcohol, which provides 70% of the total requirement, while the remaining 30% comes from other local and foreign suppliers. Raw Alcohol is transported to the plant by tanker. Within the plant, the alcohol is blended together with demineralized water, sugar and other ingredients.

• SUGAR. Victorias Milling Corporation supplies some of the company's sugar, while the rest is imported.

• WATER. The plants use considerable amount of water for blending liquor products and cleaning bottles. Water is made available by the local utility. All of the plants are equipped with large tanks to store water and the process of demineralization is made easier using its own facilities.

• VARIOUS INGREDIENTS. Various ingredients and flavoring agents are used in the production of rum. The main distributor is International Flavors, which supplies 75% of the company's requirements.

• BOTTLES. Asia Brewery Incorporated, the Company's affiliate,manufactures the glass bottles. The bottles account for approximately 33% of the total cost of goods sold. Tanduay maintains a network of bottle dealers across the nation who retrieves the bottles from the market and sells them back to the Company. The cost of reprocessing used bottles is 50% lower than purchasing new bottles.

When the cheap ass, recycled bottle represents a third of the cost of the product, we gotta problem.

Tanduay states that their products are actually a mixture of purchased ingredients: "alcohol" (brought in by tankers from Asian Alcohol), "demineralized water", "sugar" (from Victorias Milling Corp) and "other ingredients" (flavorings from International Flavors).

Their "rums" are literally assembled from these ingredients. Not what I consider a real rum at all, but more resembling a highly distilled, high alcohol, tasteless mass produced alcohol (hopefully cane based) to which other ingredients are added to create a rumlike profile. The mass of American flavored and spiced rums are produced in a similar way.


Is there a difference?

Of course.

There is a world of difference between tasty pot stilled or blended rums distilled to lower proofs (which can stand on their own) - with the mass-produced column factory products in which every drop of alcohol is squeezed out to relatively tasteless high proofs (and which depend on the additives for flavor).

Tanduay I think goes beyond this. They do not even refer to purchased "rum", but to purchased "alcohol" in their assembly recipe. A big red flag to all of us. Can it get worse?

Much. When pussified websites like the Shillery or the Liquorature fall prey, as usual, to the label of "rum" on the bottle, with little or no concern with what is actually in the bottle, and proceed to give glowing reviews to what is "rum" in name only. The Rino of spirits.

Look, I love and respect real, pure quality rum. But the only way the manufacturers and distributors will provide it is if we all work together to out the alterers and promote the good stuff.

Otherwise we get - Tanduay Distillers - who distill nothing but an invented bottle of crap.

[RT]

How is this different from Bacardi?

[Stefan]

There are many more manufacturers that mixes imported rum with industrial alcohol. I think most of the German and Austrian rum brands practice this. These are big brands in Europe and sell a lot, so I was quite surprised when I found out about it. It is important to know what you spend your money on since the regulations, when they do exist at all, permits a lot.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rum: "In Germany, a cheap substitute for genuine dark rum is called Rum-Verschnitt (literally: blended rum). This distilled beverage is made of genuine dark rum (often from Jamaica), rectified spirit, and water. Very often, caramel coloring is used, too. The relative amount of genuine rum it contains can be quite low since the legal minimum is at only 5%, but the taste of Rum-Verschnitt is still very similar to genuine dark rum. In Austria, a similar rum called Inländerrum or domestic rum is available. However, Austrian Inländerrum is always a spiced rum, (brand example: Stroh) German Rum-Verschnitt, in contrast, is never spiced or flavored."

Sources:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rum
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rum
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stroh
http://www.refinedvices.com/soennichsen ... hnitt-1951

[Capn Jimbo]

Great replies...

To RT: as far as Bacardi is concerned, the difference is honesty. Bacardi produces huge, industrial amounts of a light rum. A little is aged (think Bacardi 8, decent but not exceptional), but most is used for white and gold mixers, or as the base for their honestly labeled flavored and spiced offerings.

Bacardi operates as the powerhouse it is, demanding prime shelf space, even insisting that bars get rid of their competitors. The Walmart of spirits. OTOH Tanduay, also a huge producer does not label honestly (although readers of their website can learn the truth published there).

Their admittedly altered product is still labeled just "rum", and the age statements, if any, refer to the oldest rum in the blend.


To Stefan: Actually what the Germans import is not "industrial alcohol". In fact, what they import is very high ester, high proof, quality Jamaican rum, which is then blended to produce their honestly labeled "Rum Verschnit" (blended rum).

I have long been aware of the German practice, and have a bottle labeled "Calidao Original Jamaican Dark Rum", which is not a Verschnitt but a straight ahead nice Jamaican style product. Germany has long been a destination for fine Jamaican rum, pot stilled and containing way, way more congeners than most of the rums on the market.

At the time this was due to heavy taxation on rum per se.

In fact, Jamaica produced these special, heavy and very flavorful rums especially for this trade. Keep in mind that high proof spirits had the advantage of much lower shipping costs than transporting grain or molasses (which are much heavier and bulkier). The high proof, high quality rum can then be diluted to bottling strength with thinner high proof spirits and/or water.

A product like this is honestly labeled, as you noted, as Rum-Verschnitt ("blended rum"). The Calidao I have is simply labeled "Jamaican Rum" and is not a Verschnitt.

As far as taste goes I urge all readers to visit Stefan's link to Count Silvio's review of one of the last remaining Verschnitt's from 1951 (link). Thanks again for your informative links.

BTW, I would take issue with the websites that call the German Rum Verschnitt "a cheap substitute". It is not, indeed this blended product features more congeners/flavors (from 400 - 1500) than most of the products we call rum (which average perhaps 50 or 70 congeners). Don't believe me? Read Count Silvio's review (linked in the preceeding paragraph).

The German Calidao I have is quite aromatic, authentic and tasty as I expect of all Jamaican products.


Summary:

Compared to Bacardi and German rum products, Tanduay is indeed a cheap and fraudulent product. That Tanduay gets good reviews - as "rum" no less - at the Shillery and at Liquorature is proof positive of the poor quality rum narrative being promoted on the net.

And that is the real point...

[JaRiMi]

I have reviewed several different Tanduay rhums in the past, most of these reviews can still be found.

I do think it is clear that the law of the Philippines allows added flavour ingredients etc. to be used in rum - Haven't got a copy of their local law book, but as a past colonyt to Spain, I think this statement is pretty true (correct me please if I am wrong, but do provide also proof of this please).

Most Latin American countries seem also to have similar laws, allowing new make rum spirit to be "spiced up" - even if the final product doesn't state any such practice used. [In this sense, the good pinoy people are quite honest in comparison, reading what Tanduay says about their rum on their website].

Sugar cane is grown on a reasonably large scale in the Philippines still, despite the world market sugar prices being consistently low. Sugar cane employs still more than half a million farmers in the Philippines according to some sources (see link below).

http://www.apmforum.com/columns/orientseas17.htm

I think it is clear that Tanduay's rhum's are based purely on alcohol distilled from molasses in local (column) stills, at it's many different distillation plants located accross the islands of the Philippines. Tanduay is a HUGE player in the field of Philippines alcohol business (see links below), locked in a battle with their rival, Ginabra San Miguel.

http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/view/13147

Business Enquirer

FYI, Asian Alcohol inc. is a part of the quite complex corporation (same as Tanduay), as such no, they aren't using spirit from other manufacturers, and all of the spirit is made in the Philippines, from local cane molasses.

The Tanduay rhums are definitely worth tasting, and their price in the Philippines is very, very low - even the "15yo" (again, I doubt these age statements as well...) costs less than 10 bucks American a bottle! And I am 100% certain their production methods comply with the Philipino laws.

These are, on other hand, commercial mass-market rums, and similarly to many other mass-market rums, I would say that the spirit IS adulterated with added sweetness, flavourings etc. It doesn't make them taste bad - but this (general "spicing" of rum) is a fact that more rum lovers (like myself) should genuinely be aware of - and perhaps ask the producing companies to be more open about (what is used to flavour the rum, how much, at what stage, etc etc).

Philippines is a proud, rum-consuming nation in Asia. The people are friendly, and funloving, good people. Tanduay's rhums are good mass-market rums, and some of them are very smooth and tasty in their own right. A vast, vast majority of their rum is sold in the dark rum category and the spirit is definitely young, coloured & flavoured with "additives".

They are not what I'd call "pure" rums I think - then again, the same can be said for many other rums from Latin countries as well!! This is not a Tanduay-only issue, and nobody should understand it to be so either, I feel.


Tanduay says:

"There are four main ingredients involved in the production of rhum, namely: distilled alcohol, demineralized water, sugar, and other ingredients. The rhum is produced by ageing raw alcohol from cane molasses in oak barrels for two years or longer depending on the intended strength, flavor and quality of the liquor. After ageing, the alcohol is blended with demineralized water, sugar and other ingredients."

Funnily enough, I think this honest statement should be shared by many, many other makers of "commercial mass-market" rums..! Big up to Tanduay for honesty - but I'd of course like to see a detailed description of the process as well...Hmm.

(Then again, just a similar to Tanduay's admission would be nice to see from many Latin distillers who instead choose to hide facts...).

[JaRiMi]

Just to add to this, Bacardi as I have heard from industry sources at Angosture Ltd. for example (I do not claim to be 100% correct here, this is hearsay) buys much bulk rum from the international markets, and this is all blended into Bacardi's actual rum Products (read: bottlings). Bacardi's admittedly massive distillation plants do not produce enough rum to match the demand.

Angostura's stock majority used to be owned by Bacardi until 2000, for the very purpose of A) making sure Angostura doesn't compete internationally with Bacardi by selling their own brand name bottlings, and B) to secure the important and much needed bulk rum supplies needed by Bacardi. Then CL Financials managed to buy the majority, and they released Angostura rums internationally, but according to what I was told in 2001 at least, they continued to supply bulk & ready-blended aged rums to Bacardi. Maybe this situation has changed now, I dunno.

I would really not say that what Tanduay is doing is any different from most mass-market commercial rum product sellers in Latin America for example - the issue is rather that they make rum just as others, and comply with the laws of their country (which allow flavouring of the spirit then sold as "pure" rum). Difference is, Latin rum producers (and their commercially-interested lackey's like Preacher Ed) tend to go to great lenghts to hide this fact about their "hyper-premium" expensive products...

EDIT: Sugar is cheap today - and so is molasses. Making rum is not expensive, and in a country like Philippines where raw materials are local, and labour is also very cheap, making rum is, also, cheap. Very little of the rum is aged for long, and even storage locally is - cheap. As is, the bottle costing 33% is probably honest truth. What is the cost of the bottle in, say Colombia, out of the total cost of a local rum? Don't know, but I suspect is is at least 20%.

The Tanduay website is easy to misread, and yes, it may give an impression that their rums are somehow less quality than someone elses elsewhere. The corporate arrangements are a mess, maybe for taxational reasons each distillery plant practically is it's own company.

I do think the difference isn't all that radical when comparing to many other commercial players - just the communication they put there is. What is obvious is that they are doing the product they call rum very differently from say Richard Seale in the sunny island of Bimshire (Barbados).

But then, Richard Seale really IS an exception in the world of rum. But most people in the rum world (where any brown spirit with a fncy name & pricetag to match is ahh-so-good) do not get this point at all. I know Captain J does, and I hope more of you will also get this in the future.

--------------

In conclusion: I agree with the good Captain that Tanduay is a good example of what's wrong with rum industry today - i.e. lack of "pure" rum. Thing is, Tanduay is honest about it - whilst others aren't. And no, to avoid confusion - Tanduay doesn't just buy alcohol from others, their website is just not very clear on the message. Hey, at least they admit openly using additives - first I've seen. Hooray!!!