guaro is a distilled alcoholic drink from Central America. It is a variety of aguardiente, a general name in the Spanish Caribbean for distilled spirits made from sugar-cane juice and the byproducts of sugar making. See aguardiente and aguardente and Caribbean. Guaro probably began as a variety of illicitly made “bush” rums used to meet the alcoholic demands of African and Indigenous laborers. Today, guaro production is more regulated, especially in Costa Rica, where it is distilled in column stills to a neutral spirit and then diluted with water upon reaching markets. Elsewhere, it is frequently found as a pot-distilled moonshine, often flavored with local fruits. While guaro is a distilled drink today, the name probably has its origins in the fermented sugar-cane-based drinks of the past. Its name probably descends from the cognate terms guarapo, guacapo, grippo, and grappe, used in the early colonial era in many parts of the Spanish, British, and French Caribbean for fermented drinks made from sugar-cane juice. The drink was primarily associated with enslaved Africans, who produced them on sugar plantations. They made these drinks to recreate as closely as possible the fermented beers and palm wines that were traditionally consumed throughout much of the West African homelands of enslaved peoples in the Caribbean. See sugar cane.
See also Central America.
Smith, Frederick H. Caribbean Rum: A Social and Economic History. Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2005.
By: Frederick H. Smith