Havana Club, the only 100% authentic Cuban rum available globally, has introduced two innovative additions to its experimental range of rums, Havana Club Professional Editions with Edition C and Edition D. The limited rum releases have been developed in collaboration with world leading bartenders Carina Soto Velasquez and Alex Kratena and will be exclusively available to bartenders around the world.

The new rums, which were unveiled this week at Bar Convent Berlin, are designed to push rum boundaries and to inspire bartenders to create iconic and inventive cocktails using Havana Club rum.

Havana Club Professional Edition C is a rich and raw gold rum, born from the talented minds and palates of Carina Soto Velasquez and Alex Kratena in collaboration with Havana Club Rum Master, Asbel Morales. Blended from exclusive young aromatic aguardiente with older rum bases aged in San José distillery’s ageing warehouses, Edition C has been matured for up to 12 years in large white oak barrels that are up to 40 years old. The result is a well-balanced, powerful and full bodied golden rum with an intense character and notes of tonka beans, dates, white flowers and chilli, perfect to be enjoyed both neat and mixed in high-end cocktails.

Havana Club Professional Edition D is a fresh aromatic white rum that explores the raw expression of Cuban sugarcane and aguardiente. Made from a blend of fresh destilado de caña with full-bodied and aromatic extra aged aguardientes, the flavours and aromas found in Edition D evoke the sensorial profile of Cuban sugarcane – an intense expression of Cuban rum’s unique character and the authentic origin of all Havana Club rums. The result is a highly aromatic, beautifully fragrant white rum with notes of fresh cane juice, grassy notes of mint and hay, in combination with minerals and saline profiles. Havana Club Professional Edition D was created by Head of Cuban Rum Masters,

Juan Carlos González, Cuban Rum Master, Salome Alemán and bar entrepreneurs Carina Soto Velasquez and Alex Kratena.

Carina Soto Velasquez, founding member of Quixotic Projects, a leading Paris-based hospitality company which manages iconic venues including Candelaria and Le Mary Celeste, and Alex Kratena, an award-winning mixologist and co-founder of the non-profit organization P(OUR) and owner at London’s Tayér + Elementary, contributed to the development of these new additions in collaboration with Cuban Rum masters, in a bid to nurture and inspire global bartending talent.

The Professional Edition range is available exclusively to selected leading cocktail bars around the world, including the UK, France, Greece and Cuba1. To stock the Havana Club Professional Edition range, please contact your local Pernod Ricard representative.

To support the launch, a range of cocktails have been developed by Carina and Alex, to showcase the exceptional Havana Club Professional Edition collection: