Beautiful Girls and Drinks: The Rum Renaissance Festival in Pictures

View more photos from Miami Rum Renaissance Festival 2011 here.The Miami Rum Renaissance Festival yesterday ended its weeklong celebration of the spirit of the Caribbean. The fest featured seminars, rum contests, parties, and entertainment, but the highlight was the Grand Rum Tasting at the Deauville Beach Resort in Miami Beach...

By Laine Doss

May 2, 2011

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View more photos from Miami Rum Renaissance Festival 2011 here.

The Miami Rum Renaissance Festival yesterday ended its weeklong celebration of the spirit of the Caribbean. The fest featured seminars, rum contests, parties, and entertainment, but the highlight was the Grand Rum Tasting at the Deauville Beach Resort in Miami Beach.

Aficionados sampled 100 different rums, and manufacturers wooed event-goers via exotic drinks, promotional goodies, and busty promotional models.

The rums offered ranged from light and fruity (Cruzan coconut rum) to dark and sophisticated (Dos Maderas 5+5 ten-year aged rum). There were fruit-flavored rums, light rums, spiced rums, rums made from sugar cane, and rums made from molasses. Rums were aged in bourbon casks and had distilleries on the beach. Rum, in other words, is more than one of the ingredients in a mojito.

So the next time you pour a rum and Coke, leave out the Coke. Because rum deserves a little respect, and real pirates don't use mixers.

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Laine Doss is the former food editor of Miami New Times. She has been featured on Cooking Channel's Eat Street and Food Network's Great Food Truck Race. She won an Alternative Weekly award for her feature about what it's like to wait tables.

Contact: Laine Doss

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