John Watling’s Distillery, Ltd. located at the Buena Vista Estate, announced that its super-premium JOHN WATLING’S Buena Vista rum, the “Spirit of The Bahamas”, has been awarded a Gold Medal at “The Fifty Best” awards competition in New York City.
John Watling’s Distillery, a Bahamian company, started work five years ago, off-site, to manufacture its premium and super-premium rums. For the past two years it has been restoring its home, the 1789 Buena Vista Estate, in Downtown Nassau. It recently opened its doors in April of 2013 for complimentary tours.
Jose B. Portuondo, founding partner for John Watling’s Distillery said, “With this Gold Medal our attention to production quality has been recognized internationally. The Gold Medal demonstrates how the long dormant rum industry in The Bahamas is starting to come alive and is making a very loud statement about its exceptional quality.”
Mr. Portuondo added that this is the distillery’s first win, but they plan on bringing more medals home to The Bahamas in the near future.
“The Fifty Best” is an unbiased guide to living for those with epicurean tastes. It features objective reviews of restaurants, foods, wines & spirits, travel and more. Simply it is a
good taste guide to things that taste good.
Using professional criteria, the pre-qualified panel of judges blind-tasted the aged rums and rated them individually on a 1-5 point scoring system with 5 being the best. After tallying the scores, medals were awarded based on the judges’ impressions. JOHN WATLING’S Buena Vista rum was one of ten brands to receive a Gold Medal. Other rums awarded consisted of rums that were aged for 8, 12 and 15 years.
Tourism Today
Caption: Staff members of the Ministry of Tourism share JOHN WATLING’S rum with New Yorkers recently. (Photo: Derek Smith)
