Talking Rum at the London Cocktail Club
The London Cocktail Club’s latest venue, a rum-themed bar in Bloomsbury, had its launch party a couple of weeks ago. We headed along to the venue for a chat with owner JJ Goodman and his team of mixologists to find out why rum rocks their boat and what new and wonderful drinks they've been cooking up.
Check out The Cocktails Lovers’ review of the bar
We love the sailors, pirates and mermaid theme and menu, but why did you decide to go down the rum route?
The other London Cocktail Club is a gin palace so we decided to continue down the route of British - in keeping with the current British food revival - so now we have a gin bar and a rum bar.
Rum doesn’t strike us as particularly British?
People don’t think of rum as particularly British but all our rums are from ex-British colonies – it pretty much was the British that invented the modern rum in Barbados in 1600-and-something. That and the navy association; British navy sailors enjoyed a ration of rum a day for 300 years up until the 1970s.
Why did the ration stop?
Mainly because the equipment on the ships was becoming more sophisticated - but also because of the invention of the breathalyser test. I heard a story of sailor who drank his ration of rum given to him by the government, by the British navy, and when he was driving home and he was breathalysed by the police, which is also the government. There’s a bit of a contradiction there.
You’ve got a bottle or original navy rum from the 1970s called Black Tot - that’s quite some signature drink
This is the last consignment of rum ever made up the British admiralty. If you try to buy a bottle of this wholesale it’s about £600 because once it’s gone it’s gone. It really is a piece of British history. When they stopped the ration in the 1970s they took all the remaining stock, put it in a warehouse and forgot about it. The constituent parts of the navy blend were from Barbados, Guyana and Jamaica. What they used to do was take all the rum from these islands, age it on The Thames then send it all back out to the ships. We sell it for £100 for a tot of 70ml, and we don’t make any money on that.
As well as Black Tot you’re also very proud of the house grog – what is grog?
Well, the sailors used to drink half a pint of rum a day – in one sitting. Then a man called Admiral Edward Vernon in 1740 decided that this was a problem because the men were too drunk and having problems with discipline, so he brought out a ‘grog’. It was named after him because he used to wear a grogram coat. What he did was give the men the same amount of rum but they had it in the morning and the afternoon and he diluted it 50/50 with water - the men despised him for it.
What’s in your grog?
The grog we make is a secret recipe of a number of rums, oloroso sherry, port, Madeira and Bols Genever. It’s not as accurate as the grog on the ships, but it’s got the major rums that might have been in their grogs plus a few tweaks. It wasn’t the most pleasant drink ever – just rum and water – so we’ve made it more drinkable!
Other than rum, what other drinks feature on the menu?
The whole menu isn’t rum themed there are plenty of other cocktails too. We have a section in the menu called From The Pantry which keeps on the British theme and features ingredients you might find in your pantry such as apples, coffee, egg, golden syrup and jam. There’s also a ladies section, with lots of sophisticated drinks, and an officers section with hardcore navel drinks, such as the gimlet.
What’s next for the London Cocktail Club?
We not sure yet but it will be predominantly British . We want to create slightly different bars so that you can go out to a London Cocktail Club all night and have a different experience at each bar.
The London Cocktail Club, St Giles, 224 Shaftesbury Avenue, W1
