Kenny Chesney’s Blue Chair Bay Rum: Designed for the Beach

In honor of National Rum Day, August 16, we’re highlighting a rum designed, distilled and bottled on the beach – Blue Chair Bay Rum. Rum cocktails are already synonymous with summer and beach vacations. Take the daquiri, pina colada or mojito – all rum drinks hailing from tropical destinations. Add the beach-centric Blue Chair Bay Rum and it’s a white sandy-beach, palm-tree swaying vacation in a glass.

Blue Chair Bay Rum is unique for another reason – it is founded by the country singer Kenny Chesney and the latest celebrity-owned alcohol brand to make its way to the bar. Chesney is one of America’s most popular country stars, earning a reputation as “America’s Hillbilly rock star” having produced more than 30 Top Ten singles and winning dozens of awards from the Country Music Association and the Academy of Country Music. In 2008, he won Entertainer of the Year for the fourth consecutive year, marking one of his career peaks — at the time, no one in music (not the Rolling Stones, U2, Lady Gaga, or Justin Bieber) had sold more concert tickets in America than Chesney.

His concerts are like gigantic summertime parties, drawing an audience that wants to have fun and enjoy his happy, feel-good tunes. You’ll see people wearing colorful Hawaiian shirts and drinking tropical drinks. Beach balls flying through the crowd are a given. So it’s no surprise that his spirit of choice is rum, the king of tropical cocktails.

Trying to capture the spirit of the islands, the energy from his fans, and all the good times he’s enjoyed on the road and sailing on his boat around the Virgin Islands – the rum was born.

Here’s Kenny Chensey explaining in his own words how the rum came to be:

We recently got to sample Chesney’s rums with “The Cocktail Guru” aka Jonathan Pogash (in photo with Chesney above) at The Pikey Bar in Hollywood. Blue Chair Bay Rum, aged in white oak barrels, is available in three varietals – white, coconut and spiced coconut. All three flavors have a journal entry by Chesney inscribed on the bottle.

Lanee, of course, liked the spiced coconut neat. She said it reminded her of ‘Christmas spirit in a glass’. Lindsay liked the spiced version as well, but preferred the white rum in mixed cocktails.

Blue Chair Bay Rum Cocktail Recipes

For your own rum-centric beach party, try these tasty cocktail recipes designed by Jonathan Pogash:

Strawberry Basil Daiquiri

2 oz. Blue Chair Bay white rum
3/4 oz. fresh lime juice
1/2 oz. simple syrup 1 whole, ripe strawberry
2 basil leaves

Muddle the strawberry and basil. Add remaining ingredients with ice and shake well. Strain into martini glass. Garnish with basil leaf.

Scallywag

1 1/2 oz Blue Chair Bay White Rum
3/4 oz. St. Germain Elderflower liqueur
3/4 oz. fresh lime juice
Splash of simple syrup
2 oz. club soda
1 dash Angostura Bitters

Build ingredients directly into rocks glass filled with ice. Stir, garnish with an orange.

To find out where the next Blue Chair Bay party, event or Chesney concert is, head to the rum’s Facebook/Twitter.

Video of Kenny Chesney and photo of Kenny Chesney with Jonathan Pogash courtesy of Blue Chair Bay Rum.