I really don't know why I waste time at the Shillery, but I'm never disappointed. This time I was researching some rum history and was Googled to a thread posted by one of the sycophants entitled "Cocolo - a rum drink with history".
Bad history I'd say.
According to this excited but misguided poster he'd found a drink on spanish speaking website that promoted a drink that was "...a favorite of slaves and should be made with a "sweet" rum that is not quite white but not gold either. He calls it a third color.". Sure. Like slaves actually had "favorites" and, like the professional rummies at the Shillery, had nothing better to do than decide how they were gonna enjoy their rum today. And that "Cocolo" was one of them.
According to this poster the formula was "...one teaspoon of brown sugar, one teaspoon of honey and three or four ounces of rum". And not just any rum. Not white, not golden, but a straw color for just the right amount of flavor. No doubt shaken, not stirred, and accompanied by a Cuban stogie.
Some slaves!
Naturally the Preacher chimed in, stating:
How romantic. After a hard day of work, sittin' roun' the fire, lil' salsa and a good ole "Cocolo"! Mmmm, dat be fine, my fave drink, massa! T'anks for de rum.Preacher: "I'm sure to be served this drink to the seducing sounds of salsa would make the desire for ice evaporate even on a hot day. That sounds like the ubiquitous Caribbean cocktail of one of sour, two of sweet, three, make that four, of strong and forget the weak."
The truth is much different, of course.
Oh, the slaves were given rum alright. Rum was given as an occasional reward, to gain complicity, and even as a crude form of nutrition. But the rum was vile (not sweet) and cheap. What amounted to crude "shots" were sometimes distributed, but usually the rum was diluted with water, and only rarely with a bit of crude molasses, to make it minimally palatable.
Crude and crappy.
Hardly a "Cocolo", and a crude concoction which had almost nothing to do with the famous formula cited by the Preacher ("one of sour, two of sweet, three of strong and four of weak") - which came much later and was a fair description of the Planter's Punch consumed not by slaves, but by their owners.
According to "Caribbean Rum: A Social and Economic History" by Frederick Smith (one of the few truly scholarly histories of rum "...even though both wealthy and poor consumed rum, the upper classes still needed to distinguish their drinking patterns from the poor... with the addition of (then) exotic ingredients (to turn) ordinary rum into an elite drink called punch (one of sour, etc.)... while ordinary rum may have been the the drink of poorer classes, rum punch was an elite drink."
It is both sad and telling that today's elites wish to imagine a different history. Typical.
The history of rum is hardly pretty, and not anywhere near as romantic as some of us would have it. And rum itself has never -ever - been noble, and based on the current state of undisclosed additives and flavorings - is not likely to be.
A favorite drink of the slaves? Spare me.
