Wednesday, April 20, 2005

Flavored Rums vs. Rum-based Liqueurs

With the increasing number of coconut, mango, vanilla, coffee, pineapple, etc., flavored rums even tasting like rum, I'm left thinking that consumers interested in these products are not really going after the flavor of rum but rather after the illusions associated with the particular flavoring agents. When is a "Coconut Rum" real? When the predominant taste is rum or coconut? If the dominant flavor is coconut, and there is not perceivable trace of "aged" rum on the base alcohol, perhaps the product should be referred to as a "Coconut-flavored rum liqueur" or, more precisely, a "Coconut-flavored sugarcane spirit".

Should a person who drinks flavored rums consider himself/herself a rum drinker? What do you think?

Tuesday, April 12, 2005

Cosumer Rum Blending

I recently visited my friend (and fellow rum judge) Pat Davidson. He prepared me a delicious (ok, it was more than one) Rum and Coke. What made these drinks special was the fact that he did not use one rum, but rather the fact that he mixed two of them (in this particular occasion he mixed Bacardi 8 and Pyrat).

I wonder how many rum drinkers out there have ventured into the world of creating their own blends.... I for one, have created a "house blend" that includes about 90% Ron Botrán Añejo (12 years old), 8% Ron Zacapa Centenario (23 years old) and 2% Hallmark Demearara (25 years old). The resulting blend is only slightly more expensive to produce than the Botran Añejo is by itself, yet is very good sipping, on ice or in cocktails.

It reminds of my beer-drinking days, when my friends and I would visit Waterloo Brewing Company and get creative with their brews. A very palatable combination was 1/2 pint of O'Henry's Porter and the other half of Ed's Best Bitter.

Anyone else out there experimenting with their spirits?

Friday, April 08, 2005

Upcoming rum trip and reviews

We are exploring the possibility of publishing our rum reviews as blogs instead of as PDF articles. Let us know what you think about it. Also, we're going to be travelling in May 2005 to Hawaii to visit a distillery in Maui. Details about our trip will come soon, so stay tuned.