Ene Nyame ‘a’ Mensuro – Equiano Light
Simply put, this is my entry for Equiano Rum’s Interesting Narrative Cocktail Competition. Usually, I create a drink and then search for a fitting song as a title. However, this time I turned things around and created a drink for a specific song. Let us see how things turned out.
All Equiano rum consists of a blend of rum from Mauritius and Caribbean rum from the Foursquare Distillery. It names comes from former slave Olaudah Equiano who freed himself through trading with rum. Therefore, the rum showcases a combination of African and Caribbean rum cultures. The Equiano Light in particular consists of a mix of molasses-based rum from Foursquare and unaged sugarcane juice rum from Africa. In the end, the blend is bottled at an ABV of 43 %.
Great combination of molasses and sugarcane
The Equiano Rum starts off with a beautiful combination of sugarcane and molasses rum notes. Furthermore, you can find clear coconut notes from the Foursquare Rum and also some green flavours. In the end, there also are slight hints of ester notes. All in all, the rum is rather complex for such a young rum.
A drink inspired by a song
I based the drink on the song Ene Nyame ‘a’ Mensuro by Ebo Taylor & Pat Thomas. Ebo Taylor is a Ghanian musician who shaped the music direction of highlife for six decades. Therefore, his music serves as a great inspiration for an African influenced cocktail. Besides Ghana, highlife also has its roots in Nigeria, especially in the form of Igbo highlife. Additionally, the Igbo region was the former home of Olaudah Equiano. In highlife there also exists a sub-genre which is called Palm Wine music. This gave me the idea to use some sort of “palm wine” in the drink. However, I ended up mixing the drink as a combination of palm sugar and ginger beer. Apart from that, I decided to add some Caribbean influences with Falernum and Allspice Dram. All in all, I decided to mix the drink in a sort of Caipirinha style, to change things up a bit.
2,25 cl John D. Taylor Falernum
0,75 cl The Bitter Truth Piemento Dram
3 cl Lime Juice
2 Bsp. Palm Sugar
Top off with Fever Tree Ginger Beer
Muddle lime and palm sugar – built – Double Old-Fashioned glass over ice cubes – speed shake with small shaker tin – top off;
Garnish: Lime Twist;
Song: Ebo Taylor & Pat Thomas – Ene Nyame ‘a’ Mensuro;
I don’t know if it is just the way of preparing the drink, but the “Ene Nyame ‘a’ Mensuro” starts with notes reminding me of a Caipirinha. Afterall, the Equiano Light also has some fresh sugarcane characteristics. However, after a short while the spicy notes of the Falernum and Allspice Dram kick in and add a more Caribbean vibe to the drink. Through the palm sugar, the drink also gets darker notes with hints of molasses. In the end, the ginger beer rounds everything off and makes for a perfect summer refresher.
*The fact that I received a product reviewed in this article for free, did not – in any way – influence the rating of said product. The rum was provided by Kirsch Whisky.
