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With 2016 being the 10th annual UK RumFest<\/a> and a landmark year for the \u201cworld’s oldest and most famous Rum festival\u201d, Ian Burrell<\/a> and the Rum Experience team<\/a> decided to bring back the Golden Rum Barrel Awards<\/a>, sponsored this year by Green Engineering and with it I was honoured to be asked to be involved in this year’s judging panel.<\/p>\n So imagine my surprise to learn that not only was I one of the collective of judges for the first time, but that Rum.Charlosa<\/a> was also one of the five nominees in the category for the Best UK Rum Website 2016. Now I remember sitting at the 2013 Golden Rum Barrel Awards, which also happened to be the last awards ceremony, watching A Mountain of Crushed Ice<\/a> receive that year’s Rum Blogger of the Year award and saying to RumwiththeMr<\/a>s that I’d be over the moon, if I was just shortlisted to be a nominee.<\/p>\n Now, while I’ve been running this site for a number of years, I’d be lying if I tried to suggest that I’d been particularly prolific or even steady in putting out content of late, either on the site itself or over social media. However, I do try to keep abreast of my fellow bloggers and put out stuff were I can and express myself through my photography.<\/p>\n So I sat down with RumwiththeMrs and we voted accordingly, while trying to maintain a degree of impartiality by putting ourselves last, in our own category. So, bearing in mind the excellent company that we were keeping, with the other nominees:<\/p>\n I for one was content to know that we’d been nominated and that we’d simply have the opportunity to enjoy the evening, while mingling with the likes of Appleton Estate’s<\/a> Joy Spence, Foursquare Rum’s<\/a> Richard Seale, Jeff “Beachbum” Berry and Martin & Rebecca Cate of the Smuggler’s Cove<\/a> over a 3 course meal with rum.<\/p>\n As it happens, Rumbustious Times<\/a> and The Fat Rum Pirate<\/a> were unfortunately unable to attend the awards ceremony, but we did get to sit on the same table as our other friends, the Rum Diaries Blog<\/a> and The Floating Rum Shack<\/a>, along with the Brand Consultant for Spirits Elite<\/a> and Bacardi’s<\/a> UK Brand Ambassador Metinee Kongsrivilai<\/a>. So all in all a good night as far as I was concerned.<\/p>\n Photo Courtesy of the Floating Rum Shack<\/p><\/div>\n So it’s fair to say that I wasn’t expecting what happened next when they announced the winner of the Best UK Rum Website 2016.<\/p>\n We won… And to top that, I was even presented with the award by the lovely Joy Spence.<\/p>\n Rum heaven… I’m still in shock several days later as I write this<\/p>\n Now the only problem with attending an awards ceremony, that you’ve been nominated in, but with no expectation of winning, is that you rarely practice any kind of speech. So you can only hope that you don’t make a fool of yourself when you do have to talk. As such I kept mine short – at least that seemed to go down well…<\/p>\n What wasn’t so great though in hindsight, was that I forgot to thank my lovely Wife for all her support and patience over the years with this hobby of mine. Therefore, I think it only fitting that I say a huge thank you to my RumwiththeMrs and what better way for a blogger to say it, than via a website available for everyone (of responsible drinking age) to see.<\/p>\n Despite forgetting to thank her though, RumwiththeMrs made it quite clear that she was proud as rum punch of the achievement- she shouted it from the top of Facebook. Thank you my Wife \ud83d\ude00<\/p>\n I’d also like to thank my fellow nominees for their graciousness and genuine congratulations – that’s among the reasons why I consider them such excellent people to know and spend time with as friends.<\/p>\n Lastly, I\u2019d also like to thank both Ian Burrell for being such an amazing representative for rum and for giving us not only the UK RumFest, but also the Golden Rum Barrel Awards and also the entire judging panel for their votes. We\u2019re aware it was a close run thing, but between which nominees we were unable to ascertain. And as corny as it might sound, simply being nominated made us all winners in my mind.<\/p>\n The full list of category nominees and the respective winners for the 2016 Golden Rum Barrel Awards are:<\/p>\n Most Influential Rum Blender over the last 10 years<\/strong> Distillery Ambassador over past 10 years\u00a0<\/strong> Most Influential Rum bar in the UK over past 10 years\u00a0<\/strong> International Rum Brand Ambassador 2016\u00a0<\/strong> UK Rum Brand Ambassador 2016\u00a0<\/strong> Rum Bar Team of the year 2016\u00a0<\/strong> Best UK Rum Web Site 2016<\/strong> Best New Rum Brand in the UK 2016<\/strong> Rum Influencer of the Year 2016<\/strong> Rum Menu of the Year 2016<\/strong> Boutique RumFest Brand of the Year<\/strong> Consumer\u2019s Favourite Rum<\/strong> And last but not least Ian Burrell was himself presented with an engraved glass hip flask by Richard Seale, in celebration of all that he has done for the category of rum. I believe that the engraved message read as “To the great ambassador and an even better friend”. It was a wonderfully fitting end to a great night.<\/p>\n Save<\/span><\/p>\n Save<\/span><\/p>\n Save<\/span><\/p>\n Save<\/span><\/p>\n Save<\/span><\/p>\n Save<\/span><\/p>\n Save<\/span><\/p>\n Save<\/span><\/p>\n Save<\/span><\/p>\n Save<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" With 2016 being the 10th annual UK RumFest and a landmark year for the \u201cworld’s oldest and most famous Rum festival\u201d, Ian Burrell and the Rum Experience team decided to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,457,279],"tags":[570,596,487,591,593,598,597,592,331,580,594,595,579],"class_list":["post-2168","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-rum","category-rum-news","category-rumshows","tag-rumwiththemrs","tag-best-uk-rum-website-2016","tag-golden-rum-barrel-awards","tag-golden-rum-barrel-awards-2016","tag-rum-diaries-blog","tag-rum-charlosa","tag-rumcharlosa","tag-rumbustious-times","tag-rumfest","tag-rumfest-2016","tag-the-fat-rum-pirate","tag-the-floating-rum-shack","tag-the-uk-rumfest-2016"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rum.charlosa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2168"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rum.charlosa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rum.charlosa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rum.charlosa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rum.charlosa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2168"}],"version-history":[{"count":35,"href":"https:\/\/rum.charlosa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2168\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2210,"href":"https:\/\/rum.charlosa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2168\/revisions\/2210"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rum.charlosa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2168"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rum.charlosa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2168"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rum.charlosa.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2168"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Golden](\"https:\/\/rum.charlosa.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/10\/golden-rum-barrel-awards-2016-best-uk-rum-website-nominees.jpg\")
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\nJoy Spence (Appleton Rums, Jamaica) – Winner<\/strong>
\nAlexandre Gabriel (Plantation Rum, France)
\nJuan Gavito Sanchez (Bacardi, M\u00e9xico)
\nTito Cordero (Diplom\u00e1tico Rum, Venezuela)
\nNestor Ortega (Santa Teresa, Venezuela)<\/p>\n
\nJohn Georges (Angostura Distillery, Trinidad) – Winner<\/strong>
\nJose Sanchez Gavito (Bacardi, Mexico)
\nJoy Spence (Appleton Estate, Jamaica)
\nRichard Seale (Foursquare Distillery, Barbados)
\nRoberto Serralles (Serralles Distillery, Puerto Rico)<\/p>\n
\nTrailer Happiness (London) – Winner<\/strong>
\nMahiki (London)
\nMojo\u2019s (Leeds)
\nMojo\u2019s (Manchester)
\nThe Liars Club, Manchester<\/p>\n
\nAlexx Mouzouris (Don Q Rum) – Winner<\/strong>
\nDaniyel Jones (Angostura Rum)
\nDickie Cullimore (Bacardi Rum)
\nMeimi Sanchez (Havana Club)
\nMiguel Smith (Mount Gay Rum)<\/p>\n
\nGeorge Frost (Duppy Share) – Winner<\/strong>
\nJon Lister (Diplomatico Rum)
\nJonathan Almonte (Botran Rum)
\nMetinee Kongsrivilai (Bacardi Rum portfolio)
\nSean Duprey (House of Angostura)<\/p>\n
\nMahiki, London<\/strong> – Winner<\/strong>
\nTrailer Happiness, London
\nThe Merchant House, London
\nRum & Sugar, London
\nThe Liars Club, Manchester<\/p>\n
\nRum Charlosa<\/a> – Winner<\/strong>
\nRumbustious Times<\/a>
\nRum Diaries Blog<\/a>
\nThe Fat Rum Pirate<\/a>
\nTheFloatingRumShack.com <\/a><\/p>\n
\nFoursquare 2006 Single Blended Rum<\/strong> – Winner<\/strong>
\nDon Q Signature release 2005
\nNine Leaves Rum Angel\u2019s Half French Oak Cask
\nVelier Hampden Jamaica 2010
\nWild Tiger Rum
\nFoursquare 11 year Zinfandel Cask<\/p>\n
\nLuca Gargano (Velier Rums, and Ambassador of Pure rums) – Winner<\/strong>
\nFederico Hernandez (Midwest & California Rum Fests)
\nMartin Cate (Smuggler\u2019s Cove voted Best bar in USA)
\nRichard Seale (Foursquare Distillery)
\nJeff Beachbum Berry (Tiki Historian, Author and Latitude 29 Bar owner)<\/p>\n
\nCubana (Sheffield) – Winner<\/strong>
\nRum & Sugar (London)
\nRum Kitchen (London)
\nThe Merchant House (London)<\/p>\n
\nNine Leaves \u2013 Japan – Winner<\/strong><\/p>\n
\nDiplomatico rums \u2013 Venezuela<\/strong> – Winner<\/strong><\/p>\n