Yo Ho Ho and a Bottle of Rum

Seeing how I just purchased my Jimmy Buffett tickets for his Tampa show and his popular song Volcano says “where I go I hope there’s Rum,” I thought I’d conduct my very own Rum tasting and report out on my findings. A Rum tasting can be quite a daunting task if you don’t scope it properly. After all according to Wikipedia there are about 7 grades (types) of rum (Silver(White), Gold, Spiced, Dark, Flavored, Overproof, and Premium) and you definitely want to compare apples to apples. With that in mind I figured I start out with the most popular grade of rum, Silver.

Rum is made by distilling fermented sugar and water. The sugar comes from sugar cane and is fermented from the cane juice or molasses. Molasses is nothing more than the crystallized sugar that has been extracted from boiling cane juice. The origin of Rum dates back to ancient India and/ or China where there is record of people first drinking fermented sugar cane juice. The first distillation of Rum is credited to Barbados during the 17th century. While the U.S., Canada, Australia, and Asia all produce Rum, the majority of it is produced in various countries all over the Caribbean.

As I mentioned before I chose to taste Silver Rums. These Rums are generally light, clear and have very little flavor other than their sweetness. Because of their mild flavors they are usually only used for mixed drinks. I limited my tasting to a total of 4 different Rums (Bacardi, Cruzan, Castillo, Largo Bay). All of these are on the cheaper side and cost less than $15 for a 750ML bottle. In the case of the Castillo, I actually got a liter for less than $10. I conducted a blind tasting so I wouldn’t be influenced by bottle name. I evaluated the Rums on their nose, initial taste, and finish. Here is the outcome:

Rum A-had a light rum flavor with a hint of vanilla on the nose, the taste had a mild rum flavor with a slight sweet note. The finish had very little burn in throat.

Rum B-had a similar nose to A with a little more alcohol sting to it. The taste was buttery with a mild rum flavor on the tongue. The finish had a slight alcohol burn to it.

Rum C-had a rubbing alcohol smell to it and was very spicy on the tongue tasting nothing like rum. The finish had a pretty good burn to it.

Rum D-could have been water for all I know as it hardly smelled like rum. The taste was boring with little to no flavor at all. The finish on the other hand was very smooth, hardly a burn at all.

There was a clear divide between the 4. Both A and B came in a close 1 and 2 respectively. While B had a slightly better taste A’s smell and finish put it over the top for me. C came in dead last as it smelled, tasted, and finished horribly to me. D came in 3^rd, however, could have come in 1 or 2 had there been some flavor of any kind as it was very smooth going down.

A=Bacardi – Distilled in Puerto Rico, cost  ~$0.41 per oz
B=Cruzan – Distilled in St. Croix, cost ~$0.39 per oz
C=Castillo – Distilled in Puerto Rico, cost ~$0.30 per oz
D=Largo Bay Distilled in Barbados, cost ~$0.36 per oz

Of interest to me is Bacardi LTD owns Castillo Rum, if you believe what you read the two rums are made identically just placed in different bottles. This means you can buy Castillo for $0.11 cheaper per oz or save approximately $3.00 on a 750ml bottle and still have the equivalent of Bacardi Silver. The kicker is if they are indeed the same they should taste the same. In my tasting I found them to be completely different and not in a good way.

When I began this test I must admit I expected Bacardi to come in close to the bottom. I was quite shocked with the results when the bottles were revealed to me. While there are many silver Rums on the market, if you're looking for a good cheap silver rum to build a cocktail off of Bacardi or Cruzan would be my choice with a slight nod to Bacardi.