JULY-AUGUST_2016-FinalLR

PROFILE

traditional botanicals that are in gin. It makes it great for martinis, gin and tonic. ROB: I’m interested in howyouwent fromrum to whiskey. LA 1 was the first legal, Louisiana produced, AGED whiskey since Prohibition. What made you decide to do a whiskey? BETH: That was the brainchild of my husband Tom and Tyson, our master distiller. I was not a whiskey drinker until we made our whiskey, and it was so good and smooth. I do like a good drink made with the whiskey, but I prefer it on the rocks. ROB: Location has a lot to do with whiskey distillation. How does Louisiana’s geography and weather affect whiskey distillation? BETH: It helps out quite a bit. It speeds up the aging process. It’s so hot we don’t turn on the air conditioning in the warehouse.We just use the natural heat to heat up the barrels. ROB: For how long? BETH: We age the whiskey for one year. ROB: I’m not sure our readers outside this area are familiar with legend of the rouxgaroux, the Cajun werewolf, and namesake of your rum. Can you give us some background? BETH: Our partner Jennifer Peltier, is the one who came up with the name Rougaroux. She’s not even from south Louisiana! She grew up in Arkansas. It’s such a fun story, and it describes the culture here so well because it’s the Cajun boogieman. You have the Sasquatch, and different areas of the country have their own version of the boogie man. Well, here in the sugar cane fields and in the swamps we have rougaroux, which is the Cajun boogie man. We thought with the story we could follow along the lines of our product. Rougaroux has a curse that lasts 101 days, so we thought let’s do a clear rum over proof rum that’s 101 proof. The rougaroux comes out on full moon so lets name our dark rum Rougaroux full moon. The 13 pennies we thought, how cool is that? The legend has it that if you place 13 objects outside the door or window, the rougaroux can only count to 12. 13 wards the Rougaroux away because it gets confused. It can’t count past 12.That’s a fun story. We even have 13 pennies outside of our distillery. ROB: Share the difference between your Rouxgaroux rums: Full Moon Dark, Sugarshine and 13 Pennies? Would you

recommend one over the other for certain cocktails, say a dark and stormy or a daiquiri or mojito, or is it more a matter of preference? BETH: The Full Moon is more of a whiskey sippers rum because it’s very smooth. It makes a great dark and stormy, and it mixes well. It also tastes great on the rocks. Sugarshine is our clear rum. We call it rum moonshine. It’s very bold. 13 Pennies is our praline rum. It has a nice pecan flavor to it —we use local pecans, of course. It’s got a little bit of sweetness to it from the cane syrup—we get that up the road in Schriever —and the right amount of vanilla. It’s great for mixed drinks, and of course it’s great to cook with. I use it for Bananas Foster, crème brulée, when I make a pecan pie.We actually have pralines that we sell from the distillery that they make with the praline rum. ROB: You mentioned your master distiller here in Thibodaux. BETH: Yes,Tyson Frizzell. Let me introduce you. ROB: Hi, Tyson What does the master distiller do? TYSON FRIZZELL: I come up with all the recipes and design the proofs. A proof is the alcohol content.

ROB: How do I become a master distiller? It sounds like a great job. TYSON: The best way would be to get a fermentation background or a chemistry background. Of course it’s very important to have a good palate. ROB: What is the distilling process for each spirit? TYSON: The basic process of distilling is you brew the wash or mash, which is where you convert the starch into sugar, then you add the yeast,which converts it to alcohol.You’re taking that percentage of alcohol and evaporating it. For the whiskey we blow 160 proof. For the vodka you have to be over 190 proof. ROB: Can anyone see how all of this is made? BETH: Absolutely. We’ll give you a tour of the actual process of distilling any of the spirits we make. We have tours Monday through Saturday, and our tasting room is open, Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, 10am to 6pm, Thursday and Friday, 10am to 8pm, and Saturdays noon to 8pm. ROB: Thank you for your time. BETH: Cheers.

“We live in the middle of sugar cane country. The raw ingredient for our rum is right outside our doors. The rice for our vodka, gin and whiskey is grown just two hours away in Reyne. ”

ROUSES.COM 47