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    Echo Spirits Debuts Another Rarity with Queen’s Share Rum

    Echo Spirits Distilling is rolling out a new speciality sipper just in time for the holiday season.

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    The Queen’s Share Rum is available starting Wednesday, November 17 at the distillery’s bottle shop, 985 W. Sixth Ave. in Fifth by Northwest.

    Not just any other rum, Echo Spirits will be one of a handful of distilleries around the globe turning out the rare spirit.

    “We wanted to show off the best parts of our hard work,” said head distiller Nikhil Sharoff. “The Queen’s Share was historically the richest portions of the rum, reserved only for kings, queens, and heads of state. As rum became a spirit for the people, most distilleries stopped producing the Queen’s Share.”

    Queen’s Share Rum is boozier than Echo Spirts’ standard white rum – 108 proof versus 84 proof – putting it on the high-end of overproof rums. It’s also time intensive to make. The initial rum distillation process leaves behind some flavor-rich liquid that’s part ethanol, part less-drinkable portions of the alcohol.

    Photo by Zach Wilke

    “Instead of redistilling, we save up those portions of the distillation until we have enough liquid to redistill on its own,” says co-distiller Joe Bidinger. “From there, we have to distill very carefully to separate the good bits from the leftovers. It takes a lot of discipline to keep only the parts we want to keep and ignore the rest. But that’s what makes the Queen’s Share so special.”

    Echo Spirits has to do 10 to 12 runs of its normal rum to be able to produce just one barrel of Queen’s Share. Add in 18 months of aging and that means there’s only one barrel available this year, and next year, but Bidinger hopes things will open up a bit after that.

    As for taste, Queen’s Share has its own unique profile that’s earned descriptors like intense, rich and almost candy-like, with tasting notes of butterscotch, caramel and honey. Bidinger says it doesn’t pick up as much oaky flavor from its barrel as a whiskey might, but the aging process concentrates the oils and esters and flavor profiles of a rum.

    Overall, it’s an easy sipper that’s more geared towards on-its-own consumption, but Bidinger says it could definitely make its way into cocktails.

    Queen’s Share is the second old-world spirit Echo Spirits has released, following last year’s debut of gin predecessor Genever.

    Why go old school?

    “I think a lot of it’s just trying to do something different,” Bidinger says.

    He lays out the Ohio distilling landscape. Most distilleries are focused on vodka and whiskey for two reasons: they are the state’s best sellers and grain is so readily available. However, Bidinger approaches their lineup with a mindset more like a brewery. Echo Spirits has its core lineup, but outside of that, why not keep things fresh, do something different – as breweries do all the time.

    In that spirit, the distillery has a few barrel-finished spirits and one-off products that came out of tinkering during the pandemic up its sleeve. They’ve also just put aside their first barrel of bourbon, with plans for a quarterly bourbon series release.

    The Queen’s Share Rum will retail at $70 a bottle and be available only at Echo Spirits’ bottle shop. The bottles go on sale Wednesday, November 17. That day The Bar at Echo Spirits will also debut its new cocktail menu.

    For more information, visit echospirits.com.

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    Susan Post
    Susan Post
    Susan is the editor of The Metropreneur and associate editor of Columbus Underground, and also covers small business and entrepreneurial news and the food scene in Central Ohio.Susan holds a degree in Communication with a minor in Professional Writing from The Ohio State University. She sits on the board of the Central Ohio Pro Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists and loves coffee, whiskey, cooking and spending time with friends and family.
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