![]() In spite of all the beautiful engineering that goes into their design, stills can be ‘temperamental’: there is always something that will ‘upset’ even the best-run operations. What does a typical day of work involve for you?Ī typical day in life of a distiller revolves around maintaining the quality of the rum. Overseeing things is master distiller John Georges - we asked him what is involved in his day. It’s a system they’ve added to over the years, and now produce some 600,000 cases of rum and 200,000 cases of bitters each year. ![]() That’s thanks to their distillery in Laventille in Trinidad, erected in 1949 and built with a unique five column distilling system. Products: Angostura rums, and Angostura Bitters rangeĪngostura are famous for their flagship Angostura Aromatic Bitters, but they’ve also got an impressive range of award-winning rums. I started with Fosters in 2006 and then reconnected with rum, joining Paradise Beverages in 2009 and developing the 13 new products that now form the Fiji Rum Co portfolio. I then spent the next 20 years in the wine industry, as general manager of Rosemount Wines and then sales director of Southcorp Wines, before moving to Fiji in 2003 to buy a resort. ![]() I got my first taste of success there, with our rums winning the award for the Most Successful Exhibitor at the Royal Brisbane Show two years running, and also earning three gold medals, six silver medals and six bronzes during that period. ![]() My background in the industry started around 35 years ago at Beenleigh Rum, when I was the youngest rum distiller in Australia. The distillery was commissioned in 1980 by then-owners Fiji Sugar Corporation, who sold it to Fosters in 1998. At the distillery, we employ around 60 people, all our products are still packed and labelled by hand.Ĭan you tell us a bit about the history of the distillery? We produce up to 1 million litres of spirit a year but have capacity to do approximately 1.6 million litres, to meet our plans for the future. We have a three column continuous still and two pot stills for rum and a 4 column continuous still for neutral spirits. Then down to the QC Lab to check on any bench top samples prior to bottling or blending, and on the tank samples from the previous day’s distillation.Ĭan you tell us a bit about the distillery itself? They’ve got some plans to expand the range in 2016, with the introduction of some new flavoured rums due to hit the market this year, so we asked distiller Liam Costello what a typical day in the distillery is like.Įach day I’m at the distillery to see how the stills are going, checking steam pressure, base temperatures, condenser temperatures, flow rate in and out of the still, testing the spirit off both the pot still and continuous stills to check on fermentations. We spoke to a few distillers and blenders and asked them about their gig, and their production facilities.Īptly named for a distillery located in Fiji, Paradise Beverages produce the Fiji Rum Co range of rums (which have clocked up some 38 medals over the last four years) and includes Bounty Rum, which took out the title of the world’s best rum at the 2014 World Spirits Awards in San Francisco in 2014. But the rum doesn’t arrive fully formed - it’s gots to get made first, and one of the other pleasures of the job is meeting the people who make this fine spirit. You know, one of the pleasures of being a bartender is all that great booze you get to drink, and rum in particular gets a good showing at this time of the year thanks to the warmer weather.
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