Ponce rum: Best Ponce Drink Recipe – How to Make Livorno Punch

Warm Italian Coffee and Rum Cocktail (Ponce Livorne)

Coffee

by:
Emiko

February 24, 2015

Every Tuesday, Italian expat Emiko Davies is taking us on a grand tour of Italy, showing us how to make classic, fiercely regional dishes at home.

Today: The ultimate cold weather after dinner pick-me-up — like a hot toddy but with espresso.

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Tuscany’s port town of Livorno is famous for its rough-around-the-edges manner, whether it’s in reference to its architecture or its people. Its food is similarly rustic and often pulled fresh out of the sea. After a relaxed, long meal, the locals like to partake of a strong, hot drink that they say both helps digest a big meal and warms on cold days by the port. It’s called ponce Livornese (pronounced pon-ch-è,  with an “e” as in “echo”), a potent combination of dark rum, espresso, sugar, and a lemon twist.

The warm drink dates back to sometime between the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, when it was common for British mariners to frequent the Tuscan port. It’s hard not to notice the similarity (both in terms of recipe and etymology) between Livorno’s ponce and a British “punch” — a hot drink that consisted of tea, sugar, spices such as cinnamon, lemon juice, and liquor such as rum. A spot of punch would have been just the thing to warm up the fishermen coming in from a long night out at sea in the early hours of the morning.

It could also be considered a variation of a caffè corretto (an espresso “corrected” with a shot of liquor) or even of a hot toddy that substitutes tea for strong coffee. To make a ponce Livornese, sugar and dark rum go into a small, thick glass. (Sassolino, a strong, aniseed flavored drink, is sometimes combined with rum too, or you could use a mix of cognac and rum; some use brandy or whatever amaro is lying around. ) Then, the drink is topped with freshly made espresso (if done at home, this means a stovetop percolator espresso). A short twist of lemon rind (known as “la vela,” meaning the sail) completes the ponce. Then, it’s drunk quickly, while still hot and even before the sugar has had time to dissolve properly. This drink is not for the faint-hearted.

Livorno Punch (Ponce Livornese)

Makes 1

2 teaspoons sugar
1 ounce (30 milliliters) dark rum (or half rum and half cognac or half sassolino)
1 shot strong espresso coffee (preferably made with a stovetop percolator)
1 twist of lemon peel

See the full recipe (and save and print it) here.

Tags:

• What to Cook
• Italian
• Alcohol
• Rum

The Australian-Japanese cookbook author has lived in Florence (where a visit to a cheese farm once inspired her to start a food blog) for over 10 years with her Tuscan sommelier husband and two kids. Her third cookbook, Tortellini at Midnight, is out now.

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Taste of Puerto Rico history on Ponce rum tour: Travel Weekly

Rum is as much a part of the history of Puerto Rico as El Morro, the streets of Old San Juan or a plate of arroz con pollo.

The island’s rum industry generates more than $300 million in revenues each year and employs hundreds across many distilleries, according to the Department of Economic Development and Commerce.

The history of rum in Puerto Rico is a story of the families who settled there and began producing sugar to satisfy demand in Europe for the product.

Don Q master blender Silvia Santiago explains the distillation process to tour groups. Photo Credit: Courtesy of Don Q

The Serralles family is one of those stories. Originally from Catalonia, Spain, they immigrated to Puerto Rico in the early 1800s, settled in Ponce and since 1865 have been producing rum.

The family behind the top-selling Don Q brand is now telling their story and showcasing their craft in a tour launched in March at their facility in Ponce, on the island’s southern coast.

Sugar production was the Serralles’ first endeavor when they arrived in Puerto Rico, harvesting and refining the sugar cane that Spanish colonizers had brought to the island centuries earlier. They eventually opened a rum-producing facility at their hacienda near Ponce.

Their distilling business managed to survive the Prohibition era, which lasted from 1917 to 1933 in Puerto Rico, by concentrating its efforts on refined sugar production instead of on alcohol during those years.

The end of Prohibition signaled a new beginning for the family business, marked by the launch of Don Q, its flagship brand, in 1934.

There is a virtual reality component to the Don Q Rum Tour. Photo Credit: Courtesy of Don Q

The new Don Q Rum Tour tells of the family’s 157 years in the industry and also gives visitors a peek inside the distilling process. 

The tour takes place in the Museo Castillo Serralles, which was the home of the Serralles family for more than 50 years. The elegant 1930s revival mansion includes a butterfly nursery and a Japanese meditation garden with benches, pagodas and koi ponds.

“We feel very excited and proud to share from the Museo Castillo Serralles the history of our island’s leading rums. Don Q is an iconic brand for all Puerto Ricans because it represents, above all, culture and quality,” said Philippe Brechot, CEO of Destileria Serralles, the oldest operating distillery in Puerto Rico.

“Being able to provide this new experience for our visitors and our customers further elevates this meaning,” he said.

Participants on the rum tour learn about the history of rum on the island and the craftsmanship of Don Q production at the distillery.

The Museo Castillo Serralles, once home to a family of sugar and rum producers, and the Vigia Cross are Ponce landmarks. Photo Credit: Courtesy of Don Q

Intro to mixology

Tour participants will also take part in a mixology workshop and prepare a hand-shaken pina colada and an old fashioned as well as have an opportunity to sample rum directly from the white oak barrels in which it is stored.  The exhibit also includes an opportunity to get up close with the rum production process via virtual reality technology.

“The 90-minute tour is intended for small groups of up to 15 people max. Less than a week after the tour launched, we saw great interest and foot traffic,” said Adamarie Melendez, senior brand manager for Don Q.

“As a permanent exhibition, we’re glad it’s here to stay so that both locals and tourists alike can enjoy this experience and learn about the rich history and heritage of Don Q rum,” she said.

The tour pays commission and is conducted in English and Spanish; admission is $15 per person and must be booked in advance. Days of operation are Thursdays through Mondays at 10:30 a.m., 12:30 p.m. and 2:30 p.m. Participants must be 18 or older to take the tour and must show proof of vaccination to enter. For information, visit https://museocastilloserralles.com.

The Don Q exhibit is part of the Puerto Rico Rum Journey and Rums of Puerto Rico initiatives in collaboration with the Department of Economic Development and Commerce.

The Parque de Bombas is a firehouse-turned-firefighting museum in Ponce. Photo Credit: Courtesy of Don Q

While in Ponce … 

Adjacent to the museum is the 100-foot Cruceta del Vigia, or Vigia Cross, an iconic Ponce landmark that opened in 1984 and has withstood various natural disasters, including three major hurricanes. The arms of the cross measure 70 feet across.

Visitors can ascend the 10-story monument for panoramic vistas of the city and the sea.

While in Ponce, visitors should also make time for the Museum of Ponce Architecture, housed in a pastel-pink building that some say looks like a wedding cake, and the Parque de Bombas, a firehouse-turned-firefighting museum decked out in red and black stripes that resemble a checkerboard.

Dangerous decision for football: CAS ordered Roma to pay 1 million euros for the transfer of Ponce to Spartak. Why is it so important? – Russia 2022 – Blogs

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Explains the SILA Rights podcast.

A couple of weeks ago CAS ordered Roma to pay Newell’s Old Boys one million euros for the transfer of Ezequiel Ponce to Spartak. The disputes began back in May 2020 – then the Argentine club (the striker’s professional career began there) filed a claim with FIFA for damages in the amount of 2.4 million euros for alleged fraud with the transfer of Ponce from Roma to Spartak. nine0003

Recall the conditions of the transfer: in June 2019, Ezequiel moved to Moscow, together with the goalkeeper of the Roman youth team Andrea Romagnoli. Newell’s Old Boys had questions, because Spartak paid 2-2.5 million euros for the new keeper (data from Gianluca di Marzio), which significantly exceeded its market value (Transfermarkt estimated it at 25 thousand euros). The Argentine club felt that with the help of Romagnoli, Roma wanted to arrange a cheaper transfer for Ponce, because Old Boys were entitled to a serious percentage of future resale (40%). nine0003

At first the claim was rejected. But this did not stop the South Americans: they appealed to the Court of Arbitration for Sport and still won the case. In the Roman club, the decision was recognized as unexpected and without legal grounds – the judges awarded Ponce an arbitrary market value (6 million euros).

In the news episode of the SILA Rights podcast, this story was discussed – hosts Mikhail Prokopets, Yuri Zaitsev and Ilya Chicherov believe that this decision is dangerous for football (albeit fair):

Here is the most important of their thoughts on this matter:

“It is impossible to objectively assess the transfer value of a football player. That is, trying to determine it using links to Transfermarkt is very strange. This is certainly a very interesting information resource, which, perhaps, to some extent serves as a catalyst for determining the price, but too many factors affect the transfer value of a player. If a player is just top, scores every match and is in great demand, but he has six months left until the end of the contract, his value will tend to zero. And on Transfermarkt it will be in the region of 15-20 million. Injuries, wife, mood, mental state can easily influence this. nine0003

Such decisions are, in fairness, very dangerous. We already had a bunch of these verdicts, when you are legally right, all the arguments are on your side, and the judge thinks: “This will not be fair, so you lost.” And you sit afterwards, thinking: “How will I explain this to the client?”

So here too: a decision in which the arbitrator did not refer to any practice. The only logical argument is that Roma themselves valued Ponce in the region of six million by setting a buy out when he went on loan two seasons ago [to AEK]. But, again, then the Greeks did not buy it for seven, so the cost was not adequate either. nine0003

So the arbitrator decided that the value should be more than three, but less than eight million – “so it will be six. ” Why six? Why not five and a half? Not four?

And Romagnoli is worth €50,000 on Transfermarkt, so he should be worth a million (what? why?). Once again: this decision is unreasonable from the point of view of jurisprudence. And it is dangerous .

For example, we have seen a huge number of disputes where the cost of a football player is discussed. The parties come with experts, in this case there were also two of them: Newell’s Old Boys brought their own, who said that the deal was valued at six million, and Roma presented the expertise of Omar Ongor (a long-time and authoritative ex-head of FIFA). He said that we cannot determine the transfer value by examination: the contract, injuries and everything else affect. nine0003

And what we have now: based on this decision, each referee will be able to determine the transfer value in his opinion . This is a super dangerous story.

Although, perhaps, justice has prevailed.”

***

The only remote clue that could be found was the amount for Ponce’s transfer from Newells to Roma: the same di Marzio reported that the Italians paid 3 million immediately and registered another 3 million as bonuses – in total there is 6 million. Other sources said that Roma paid 4.2 million. The Argentine club could not know the real terms of the deal between Spartak and Roma, but they were definitely able to provide data on their sale – maybe there is just the basis for 6 million euros. But this, like the rest of the reasoning, is just a guess. nine0003

Photo: globallookpress.com/Stupnikov Alexander/spartak.com

Bayer Roma | UEFA Youth League 2015/16

Bayer Roma | UEFA Youth League 2015/16 | UEFA.com

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