By
George Brozowski
People
have been distilling all sorts of specialty spirits lately
intended for all sorts of specific functions. Not to be outdone,
the good folks at Bacardi have come up with a super-premium
mixing rum. Now, normally when you think about making a mixed
drink, you would usually reach for a lower quality and less
expensive spirit because it is going to get diluted with a
handful of other ingredients, but Bacardi feels that no matter
what you add to their rum, you should really, really enjoy
the taste of their rum. To that end, they created Bacardi
Gran Reserva Maestro de Ron.
Well,
you gotta figure that after producing rum for over 150 years
Bacardi might just have a really good idea here. After all,
a premium spirit should theoretically produce a premium cocktail.
They use a double-aging process, where rums that are aged
for at least one year are blended together and returned to
white oak barrels for an additional three months. What's really
interesting to me is that normally the aging process turns
spirits, at the very least, a light shade of brown or a tan
but this rum stays quite colorless, hopefully indicating that
the oak flavor will be both subtle and light and possibly
quite interesting.
OK.
enough of the speculation; let's get down to giving it a taste
drive. Although this rum is almost totally transparent, it
does sport a touch of a very pale yellow, straw like color.
The nose is fairly floral with hints of pear and light oak
and has absolutely no ethanol vapors. On the palate, the flavors
follow the nose with pear and oak and some honey sweetness.
The finish is smooth, sweet, nutty and medium in length leaving
a slight tingle and warmth.
It's
actually good enough to stand alone, but let's try it with
some ice and soda. Well, well, in a cocktail the oakiness
steps up a bit and I still get the sweetness and floral notes,
and those flavors blend together quite nicely and hold their
own against the soda and ice. I do believe they got it right
again when they stated this is a super-premium mixing rum.
Bacardi
Gran Reserva Maestro de Ron is 40% ABV and sells
for $24.99 for a 750ml bottle and is really worth the price.
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http://www.bacardi.com/