La Cañada Cloud Forest Rum

A rum that is made from single estate fresh pressed sugar cane juice grown in the high altitudes of Oaxaca, the harvested cane is slow fermented exclusively with wild yeasts and distilled on a custom still fabricated by the Krassel brothers, proprietors of the Cañada distillery. Brothers Isidoro, Rommel, William and Axel Krassel Peralta continue the work that their grandfather Max started in the 1930s. An immigrant who fled his home country of Germany at the start of WWI, 16-year-old Max landed on the Gulf coast of Veracruz in 1917.

With no knowledge of Spanish, Max began working any oddjob that he could find. He eventually found himself in the mountainous Cañada region of Oaxaca, where he met and married his wife. It wasn’t long before he began distilling aguardiente on a coffee farm (at that time it was common for the haciendas to distill their own cane). After learning the ropes, Max set out on his own to begin distilling his own aguardiente, using a still he designed and built himself.

Max’s three sons followed his footsteps, improving upon his still design and increasing aguardiente production. Word began to spread far away from Santa Maria Tlalixtac about the quality of the rum produced by the family. Nowadays, Santa Maria Tlalixtac has a road into town – a four-hour unpaved trek from the nearest highway that is as stunning as it is treacherous. Grandpa Max has passed away, but his son Isidoro and four grandsons Rommel, Axel, William and Isidoro keep the family tradition alive, working alongside one another in every aspect of production.

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