Today is a great day. My little corner of the digital world has now been alive for a year.
Therefore I think it is time to sit back, recap and celebrate a little.
I must admit that my rum journey has been an awesome adventure so far. And I am looking very much forward to all the unknown things which lie ahead.
In this first year a lot of things has happened. Here are a the highlights:
I cooked up 60 reviews
... and a diary. So far I have covered a wide array of different rums, with unintentional focus on a couple of independant bottlers, and an even more unintentional lack of focus on agricoles.
The latter part I hope to make up for in the time to come. The former part, I'm not sure I want to change. But I do want to visit more widely available rums in the future.
I believe that reviews are most useful, when you are actually able to go out and try or buy the rum.
But somehow, the more rare stuff is always a bit more exciting.
I caused a few ripples in my national rum community
On more than a few occasions, I stirred the pot in the Danish rumcommunity (which is one of the worlds fastest growing, mind you).
I made a couple of reviews of rums, which are very highly regarded among the Danish rummies in general, which clearly didn't match certain expectations.
There has been some good and heated discussions about scores, integrity, freebies, ability to review based on samples, and much more. All in good fun, even though there was quite a bit of ruckus along the way.
This is a game of passion and opinion a very long part of the way. Disagreements will always be a natural part of that.
I nudged a well known rum maker
... a bit out of his comfort zone.
Together with new indie bottler Florent of Compagnie des Indes, we managed to nudge non other than Mr. Richard Seale outside his comfort zone. Florent made a single cask Foursquare at cask strength, which I rewarded with a stellar 10/10 review here.
After reading it, Florent poked Mr. Seale about it, and as a result Foursquare are now on the verge of making a high proof rum themselves. I for one, will look very much forward to getting my hands on that!
That is one huge compliment going straight to my personal piggy bank of achievements. It kinda hit the nail on the head for me, that writing all of this nonsense can actually matter. Thank you for that reassurance, Mr. Seale.
I went to Berlin Rum Festival
... to meet and mingle with an insane amount of cool, friendly and interesting people. And also there was a lot of rum.
I'm not even going to try and mention all the great people I met during the RumFest, but you know who you are.
A special thank you, has to be sent to Gregers, Johnny and Daniel, who made sure that I stayed afloat during the whole thing, and made it possible for me to meet some of the many other awesome people I met.
A very special thanks and huge hat tip goes out to Lance of The Lone Caner, who hosted a small, private session the day after the RumFest, which was probably the best monday afternoon the past 35 years. I have never seen so many great rums on a single table, neither have I had a chance to go "full geek" for so many hours, with similar minded people, in many years. So thank you for making that possible, Lance.
Summary
Lots of new experiences, a couple of adventures and many new friends (and perhaps even a few enemies). Not too shabby for this RumCornerist, if I have to say so myself.
I cooked up 60 reviews
... and a diary. So far I have covered a wide array of different rums, with unintentional focus on a couple of independant bottlers, and an even more unintentional lack of focus on agricoles.
The latter part I hope to make up for in the time to come. The former part, I'm not sure I want to change. But I do want to visit more widely available rums in the future.
I believe that reviews are most useful, when you are actually able to go out and try or buy the rum.
But somehow, the more rare stuff is always a bit more exciting.
I caused a few ripples in my national rum community
On more than a few occasions, I stirred the pot in the Danish rumcommunity (which is one of the worlds fastest growing, mind you).
I made a couple of reviews of rums, which are very highly regarded among the Danish rummies in general, which clearly didn't match certain expectations.
There has been some good and heated discussions about scores, integrity, freebies, ability to review based on samples, and much more. All in good fun, even though there was quite a bit of ruckus along the way.
This is a game of passion and opinion a very long part of the way. Disagreements will always be a natural part of that.
I nudged a well known rum maker
... a bit out of his comfort zone.
Together with new indie bottler Florent of Compagnie des Indes, we managed to nudge non other than Mr. Richard Seale outside his comfort zone. Florent made a single cask Foursquare at cask strength, which I rewarded with a stellar 10/10 review here.
After reading it, Florent poked Mr. Seale about it, and as a result Foursquare are now on the verge of making a high proof rum themselves. I for one, will look very much forward to getting my hands on that!
I went to Berlin Rum Festival
... to meet and mingle with an insane amount of cool, friendly and interesting people. And also there was a lot of rum.
I'm not even going to try and mention all the great people I met during the RumFest, but you know who you are.
A special thank you, has to be sent to Gregers, Johnny and Daniel, who made sure that I stayed afloat during the whole thing, and made it possible for me to meet some of the many other awesome people I met.
A very special thanks and huge hat tip goes out to Lance of The Lone Caner, who hosted a small, private session the day after the RumFest, which was probably the best monday afternoon the past 35 years. I have never seen so many great rums on a single table, neither have I had a chance to go "full geek" for so many hours, with similar minded people, in many years. So thank you for making that possible, Lance.
Summary
Lots of new experiences, a couple of adventures and many new friends (and perhaps even a few enemies). Not too shabby for this RumCornerist, if I have to say so myself.
So, to celebrate, I think it is time to go for something special. Watch out for a review of something truly spectacular later this afternoon.
I must admit that my rum journey has been an awesome adventure so far. And I am looking very much forward to all the unknown things which lie ahead.
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