What's your latest rum purchase? - Tiki Drinks and Food

P PalmtreePat Tiki Socialite Los Angeles, CA Joined: Oct 07, 2014 Posts: 360	P PalmtreePat Posted posted on Mon, Apr 22, 2019 10:46 PM On 2019-04-21 23:00, Hamo wrote: Where’d you find that Royal Amber, Pat? Let us know when you make a Mai Tai with it. In the mail. I couldn't find anyone else stupid and crazy enough to buy half a case of obscure booze all at once and then wait around to sign for it all day on a work day just to keep the shipping charges from driving the price of an individual bottle through the roof, so I just went and ordered the whole enchilada for myself. First things first, it does indeed make a kickass Mai Tai. It comes out very different from MTs made with our usual choices for jamaicans and agricoles. It certainly goes down smooth, and like Hopechest said, it performs best all by itself. I still like a Mai Tai made with the usual suspects, but for some reason blending the Royal Amber with other rums doesn't yield the mutliplicative results that other mixes do. Also of note, this is a new packaging from what I'd seen online in the past. If I remember correctly, the old packaging purportedly billed it as a product of France, and theories circulated that it was a blend of French-Caribbean rums. This new label claims that the contents were distilled in Puerto Rico. Now, having tasted this stuff in a cocktail and all by itself, I really don't believe that. In a glass by itself it's got hints of the kind of subdued funk you'd find in a modern black blended Jamaican, ie some pot still, but a good amount of column. On the other hand, it also has plenty of flavors that really don't remind me of other rums too. http://www.amountainofcrushedice.com/?p=19258 Looking back on this AMOCI article where they talk about the kind of Martinique rum that would most likely have actually gone into later formulations of the Mai Tai (black blended molasses based rhum traditionnel, not agricole), they mention that TV-branded Mai Tai rum in the day was probably a blend of Jamaican rum, Martinique molasses rum, and cheap VI rum as padding, I get an idea. Now this is an extremely loose and sloppy experiment conceived by a mind that was two drinks in already, so don't take the results as gospel. We tasted the Royal Amber neat alongside an everyday black blended Jamaican (Coruba) and the only rhum trad. I have access to, a Guadeloupe 5 year, from Transcontinental Rum Line*. Among a panel of three tasters, the Royal Amber was consistently called the smoothest. The Coruba was heavier, and tasted back to back with the RA was noticeably smokier. The TRL still tastes like fruity hard candy and birthday candles, but was drier and harsher than the other two. Neither of the two were really in the same wheelhouse as the Amber by themselves, BUT, when the Coruba and TRL were blended about 50/50, the results were weirdly close. The features of the two that made each glaringly different from the Royal Amber mellow out and they somehow add up to taste more similar than you'd expect. To whit: Based on flavor, if you told me that Trader Vic's Royal Amber was a blend of Jamaican and molasses-based French rums, probably both column and pot stilled, I'd believe you. Given how much subterfuge and such there is in the world of rum, it wouldn't surprise me if this "distilled in Puerto Rico" business is just them cutting their imported blend with some nice cheap industrial spirits for tax purposes/to plump things out and keep costs down. Near as I can tell, this bottling represents a single marque from a pretty big array of marques cranked out in the off season by French Antilles distilleries mainly for bulk export to independent blenders and bottlers. Ergo, its probably pretty simple compared to the kind of blends they'd have been wielding back in the day, but I'm assuming they're kin.

On 2019-04-21 23:00, Hamo wrote:
Where’d you find that Royal Amber, Pat? Let us know when you make a Mai Tai with it.

In the mail. I couldn't find anyone else stupid and crazy enough to buy half a case of obscure booze all at once and then wait around to sign for it all day on a work day just to keep the shipping charges from driving the price of an individual bottle through the roof, so I just went and ordered the whole enchilada for myself.

First things first, it does indeed make a kickass Mai Tai.

It comes out very different from MTs made with our usual choices for jamaicans and agricoles. It certainly goes down smooth, and like Hopechest said, it performs best all by itself. I still like a Mai Tai made with the usual suspects, but for some reason blending the Royal Amber with other rums doesn't yield the mutliplicative results that other mixes do.

Also of note, this is a new packaging from what I'd seen online in the past. If I remember correctly, the old packaging purportedly billed it as a product of France, and theories circulated that it was a blend of French-Caribbean rums. This new label claims that the contents were distilled in Puerto Rico.

Now, having tasted this stuff in a cocktail and all by itself, I really don't believe that. In a glass by itself it's got hints of the kind of subdued funk you'd find in a modern black blended Jamaican, ie some pot still, but a good amount of column. On the other hand, it also has plenty of flavors that really don't remind me of other rums too.

http://www.amountainofcrushedice.com/?p=19258

Looking back on this AMOCI article where they talk about the kind of Martinique rum that would most likely have actually gone into later formulations of the Mai Tai (black blended molasses based rhum traditionnel, not agricole), they mention that TV-branded Mai Tai rum in the day was probably a blend of Jamaican rum, Martinique molasses rum, and cheap VI rum as padding, I get an idea.

Now this is an extremely loose and sloppy experiment conceived by a mind that was two drinks in already, so don't take the results as gospel. We tasted the Royal Amber neat alongside an everyday black blended Jamaican (Coruba) and the only rhum trad. I have access to, a Guadeloupe 5 year, from Transcontinental Rum Line*. Among a panel of three tasters, the Royal Amber was consistently called the smoothest. The Coruba was heavier, and tasted back to back with the RA was noticeably smokier. The TRL still tastes like fruity hard candy and birthday candles, but was drier and harsher than the other two. Neither of the two were really in the same wheelhouse as the Amber by themselves, BUT, when the Coruba and TRL were blended about 50/50, the results were weirdly close. The features of the two that made each glaringly different from the Royal Amber mellow out and they somehow add up to taste more similar than you'd expect.

To whit: Based on flavor, if you told me that Trader Vic's Royal Amber was a blend of Jamaican and molasses-based French rums, probably both column and pot stilled, I'd believe you. Given how much subterfuge and such there is in the world of rum, it wouldn't surprise me if this "distilled in Puerto Rico" business is just them cutting their imported blend with some nice cheap industrial spirits for tax purposes/to plump things out and keep costs down.

Near as I can tell, this bottling represents a single marque from a pretty big array of marques cranked out in the off season by French Antilles distilleries mainly for bulk export to independent blenders and bottlers. Ergo, its probably pretty simple compared to the kind of blends they'd have been wielding back in the day, but I'm assuming they're kin.

Post #794670 by PalmtreePat on Mon, Apr 22, 2019 10:46 PM