Amazon Flavors, A culinary weekend to savor! - Beverage

In such a culinary weekend, the beverage part can't be missed. At 2 pm was the rum and chocolate tasting. I looked forward to this every since I heard I got a day pass. The rum used is sponsored by Suriname Alcoholic Beverages N.V.

One thing I think was a great feature was that they also gave us spices to smell. Although it's the simple spices like sugar, anise, caramel, vanilla, butter and cinnamon that most people know, but I think most people don't really take the time to smell it thoroughly.This was very helpful when we finally tried to get a nose (smell) from the rum.

The first one was our awardwinning Black Cat. It's double distilled and won the 'Monde Selection Medaille d'Or' ( Gold medal Award) in Luxembourg. It smelled like black liquorice, which is the anise and vanilla. It tasted very sharp, sweet, but a short aftertaste.

The 2nd one was the Borgoe 82 rum. It smelled like caramel and tasted a bit heavier in cohesion to the Black Cat.

Borgoe Extra Rum is the 3rd rum we got to taste. Compared to the Borgoe 82, it smelled spicier and when drank, I fell it in my throat. 

Then the aged rums were introduced. We started with the Borgoe 5YO ( 5 year old) and it smelled stronger in aroma, but tasted milder than the rest.

We also paired it with chocolate from Tan Bun skrati. However it's green, in the way that they handcraft it from scratch using the pre-Columbian processing method without any chemicals, I think I really need to use to the texture. The higher the percentage of cacao used, the rougher the texture was. We got 3 types to taste: the 65%, 70% and 80% cacao. I like the 65% one best since it's not that sandy and it kinda melted on my finger when we finally got to taste it.

The last rum was the Borgoe 8YO. It smelled very much like brown sugar and if I may use wine standards to explain it: If all others are light to medium bodied, this one is the full body. All the flavors were well-balanced and it was heavenly (or I just had a bit too much). Unfortunately we couldn't taste the Borgoe 15YO, but who knows, maybe next year?

And if you want to read more about Borgoe, please check the latest edition of Victuals. It is a bilingual magazine, covering all kinds of culinary topics. And the pictures are always very appealing to the palate, so don't read it when  you're hungry.

After this I had to wait for my wine tasting with Riedel at 4pm. That was somewhat inconvenient though. Since I was there with the daypass, I expected to be kept busy from 9am to 8pm, like it was described in the program. It would've been very helpful if the program was more elaborate so that I would know in advance that between 12:00 -1:00pm and 2:00-3:00pm I would have a 1-hour break. I would've brought something to keep me busy.

The Riedel-seminar was also something I looked forward to. I've always heard that you have to drink the wine in the correct glass to enhance the enjoyment, but I never could've quessed that the difference could be so significant.

And if you may ever look into a Riedel brochure, you'll see that they take this fact very seriously. They have for every drink a different glass. And not only a glass for white, rose and red wine. For the reds for example, they have a special glass for every variety. A different glass for the Pinot noir, Cabernet Sauvignon and the Syrah. Same thing for the white wines. Their collection is so huge that their brochure counts 50 pages. This seminar was a real eye-opener. If you're interested or just curious, check their site: www (dot) riedel (dot) com.

We tried 5 different wines with these glasses and some tasted even bitter in the wrong glass. Raymond Kooii, the speaker of this seminar, explained a bit about how these glasses work. The human tongue differentiates 4 different flavors on different parts of our tongue: sweet, salty, sour and bitter. And every wine was determined which flavor should dominate and the glass will be made in such a way that it will hit those parts of the tongue to enhance that flavor.

While I was having the wine tasting with Riedel, the Suriname Chefs Congress was held, so unfortunately I can't tell you what happened there. But for all food lovers, my advice is to like the Suriname Chefs Association page on facebook to stay  informed of all upcoming events and see pictures of all events they'd organized till now.

Of course, the winner of the Amazon Iron Chef Competition was announced. The setting was very relaxed, which was also different than my expectations. For this, I blame the international chef competitions on tv, where the final results are always held in a more formal setting. So, I expected everyone in the congress room, with all the chefs in their chef uniform and the jury seated in front of them and building up the tension in the public.

And the winner of the competition is................................Chef Dino Jagtiani from St. Maarten. He won the moneyprize of $1500,- and some other gifts from the sponsors. One prize that made me jealous was the Riedel's Burgundy Grand Cru glass. Can you imagine drinking wine out of this glass?


However I can't compare it with last year's Amazon Flavors, because I didn't attend that one, but I believe this one must be better. And I base my opinion on these factors:

* Not only did the organizers invited foreign chefs to participate, even interested a Michelin chef to become part of the jury panel
* and not to forget our own Suriname's Yellow Gold, Borgoe, enjoyed in a different setting with Tan Bun skrati chocolates.
* Last but not least, the magical glasses of Riedel. It really opened my eyes to a whole new dimension to wine drinking.

Since this year's event has these highlights, it's only natural to think that the organizers will top this next year. I can't wait ....