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A taste of success: Steven Rioux, Takamaka
Steven Rioux, master blender of Seychelles rum brand Takamaka, was recognised for his skills at The Spirits Business Awards 2024 last month. He tells us about his journey from discovering mixology to becoming feted by the industry.
“It was just beautiful growing up here,” Steven Rioux says about his childhood in the Seychelles. “There was lots of beach time, running through the jungles, playing soccer with my neighbours. It really was a beautiful experience; it’s something I hope the younger generations still get to experience.”
A proud Seychellois, Rioux’s introduction to the hospitality industry came about at a relatively young age. At 14, Rioux picked up his first after-school job as a kitchen helper, and gradually progressed through various roles while completing his studies. In his early 20s, he took on a full-time role as a restaurant manager.
Then, in 2014, Rioux was recruited by Bernard d’Offay – who founded Takamaka Rum with his brother, Richard – to become the restaurant manager at the distillery’s La Plaine St Andre Restaurant and Rum Bar. This would become his first serious introduction into the world of mixology, and, unknown to Rioux at the time, his path to becoming an award-winning blender.
It was being given the task of making a classic Mojito during his first restaurant-manager post that ignited Rioux’s curiosity about flavours and mixology. “I made it my interest to find out as much as I could about making the perfect Mojito,” Rioux says.
“That was my first experience in taking a recipe, dissecting it down to the bare bones, and understanding why we are taking, for example, lime juice, or why do we need to muddle mint? I sought to better understand each component in the drink to be able to build a drink with absolute confidence. To know, actually, I need to muddle this a bit more, or maybe I don’t need to muddle it, maybe I just need to bruise the leaves, things like that.”
Keen to expand his knowledge further, Rioux moved to an on-trade sales-representative role with Archipelago Wines & Spirits, “which allowed me to deepen my interest in the world of international spirits, liqueurs, bitters, syrups, sake, and fortified wine”. During this time, he developed what he called a “systemic approach to mixology in a way that was not reproducible by my then competitors in the trade”. His tactic was to split the spirit base of classic recipes into “sometimes three and even four different types of spirits” while retaining the integrity of the original serve.
Blending trial
It served him well, and in 2019 he garnered further attention from the d’Offay brothers, who invited him to trial blending in the production and R&D section of the Trois Frères Distillery, the producer of Takamaka Rum. “I thought to myself, well, I’ve never done blending before, but it should be the same as stirring an Old Fashioned or stirring a Manhattan, right?,” Rioux recalls. “I thought I’d give it a try.”
Now, several years into his blender role, is it like stirring an Old Fashioned or a Manhattan? “No, it’s not, oh my goodness,” he laughs. “I remember after my first attempt at blending that quickly came to light.”
But Rioux evidently had a talent for flavour, and has since mastered his skills. He explains how he learned it’s not just about having casks of liquid that have great profiles. “You can have two casks with exceptional liquid, and you can blend them together and they just do not work,” he explains. “The key would be to find the ratio that may make it work, and to create a liquid with a new flavour approach. How do you lift the floral notes, or let the smoky notes be in the background? It quickly came to light that it’s not easy because every single liquid and cask matters, and has to be respected for what they are. On top of that, you have to think about the consumer who is going to be at the end of that product, and what they want.”
Rioux has been at the helm of multiple Takamaka rum releases, from limited-edition bottlings to permanent expressions. A key collection has been the St André Series, comprising a quartet of blended rums: Extra Noir, Grankaz, Pti Lakaz, and Zepis Kreol. Plus, in September this year, Takamaka added a blend of 100% unaged local sugarcane rums to its Le Clos series, called Napa Laz. The rum went on to win not only a Master medal in The Luxury Masters 2024, but claimed the top title of Luxury Taste Master 2024 following the judges’ vote. It’s an additional testimony to Rioux’s talent.
He talks about his favourite Takamaka rum that he has worked on: “We have a blend that we only sell at the distillery shop, and in our outlet at the Seychelles airport. This blend is not the most complicated, but it takes up to six components of traditional, barrel-aged rum, and rum from our pressed-rum production process. That was enjoyable to take two categories of rum, which we normally keep separate, and join them together to create this distillery blend.”
Blender of the Year
Rioux’s work was awarded further recently when he was crowned Blender of the Year at The Spirits Business Awards 2024. Rioux was praised by the judges for being a “master of his craft”, and they noted the high quality of Takamaka’s rums under his guidance.
“It was very important for me personally,” Rioux says. “It was an affirmation of the work I have been doing here, that we have been doing at Takamaka, at the distillery, and to be awarded Blender of the Year in a very eclectic and competitive industry such as the spirits industry was almost unreal for me. When I saw my name up there at the awards against the other shortlisted finalists, I thought, ‘OK Steven, you came here, at least you’ve been nominated, that’s special enough. But I don’t think we’re going to take this home.’ And then to hear ‘Steven Rioux, Takamaka’, and walking up to that stage was amazing. It was a very proud moment for me. It was a very important moment for the Seychelles.”
What is clearly evident about Rioux is the pride he feels in being Seychellois – and he, and the Takamaka team, are eager to continue promoting this tropical archipelago, to showcase what it is capable of.
“To be able to show my fellow brothers and sisters what is possible and achievable, I’m incredibly proud of that,” Rioux adds. “I’m very happy to be in this situation where I believe I’m playing a very important hand in the business and the direction we want to go in, and that the d’Offay brothers see us going in the future. I’m super-chuffed to have joined the journey, and I hope we will continue to share our rums from the Seychelles worldwide.”
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