Rum Starts with an Arrr!
If it were me, I’d schedule Talk Like a Pirate Day for the Saturday before Memorial Day rather than September 19th. Because the onset of warm weather puts me in the mood for rum drinks. And drinking rum always makes me feel like a pirate. I have been led to believe that pirates love to sing.
Fifteen men on the dead man’s chest–
…Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum!
Drink and the devil had done for the rest–
…Yo-ho-ho, and a bottle of rum!
– Robert Louis Stevenson
Rum isn’t a popular spirit. It is often not taken seriously. And that is a crime. But there is an upside to this. You can get some of the world’s best rums at a pittance in comparison to say, the world’s best whiskeys or brandies.
You just need to know what to look for.
And what to look for really depends on what kind of pirate you are feeling like.
If you are feeling like a red-bearded pirate sailing around Bermuda, you will likely be going for a Dark and Stormy. The ingredients are easy to find if you are pillaging villages in Bermuda, but much more difficult if you are further afield. It is a simple mixture of Gosling’s Black Seal rum and Barritt’s ginger beer. Should you add lime, be prepared to walk the plank.
If your pirate likes to take port in Cuba, and has a taste for the classics, you will likely want a white rum of character to mix with lime and sugar for a traditional daiquiri. Bad white rums are plentiful and are primarily to blame for the spirit’s tarnished reputation. Good white rums are surprisingly hard to find. A couple to look out for are Brugal from the Dominican Republic and Myers Platinum White from Jamaica. There are some very good white rums that are a good bit more expensive, like 10 Cane, but unless your pirate has a lot of booty those might be best reserved for sipping.
But your pirate may eschew mixers, and prefer to drink rum straight from the bottle. In that case, you probably want a rum that is dark like your pirate soul, assuming of course you still have a soul. I say go for the gusto and find yourself a bottle of the 15-year-old Rhum Barbancourt from Haiti. Albany pirates don’t even have to make the long trip to the island. $40 gets you a tipple that F. Paul Pacult called:
So smooth, it’s sinful—so ripe and sweet, it’s decadent—a true benchmark rum that’s as elegant as brandy and as complex as a blended Scotch; it blew me away, period.
5* Highest Recommendation
I understand there are also less hardened pirates, who may want something dark, but may want to mix their poison into a cocktail on occasion. Those should look for the Appleton Estate V/X from Jamaica or Brugal Añejo from the Dominican Republic. A small step down, but still a solid contender, would be Mount Gay from Barbados.
This of course assumes that you are shopping in the U.S. If you make it to Canada or Mexico or anyplace else that doesn’t have a trade embargo with Cuba, you should seriously try some of the forbidden fruit. I hear it’s twice as sweet.
Yay! You’re awesome. Thanks! Also, what’s a pirate’s favorite piece of furniture?
An arrrrrmoirrrrre
A horse ran at the track a couple of years ago name Arrrr–the announcer was enjoying every second of tracking the horse around the oval, saying the name pirate-style at every mention. You can get a great Dark and Stormy at Max London’s.
http://ridiculousfoodsociety.blogspot.com/2008/10/pirate-cuisine-hardtack-and-bone-soup.html
I wrote the above post about in pirate.
I am a big supporter of spirits and cocktails and I appreciate your recent posts, but I started reading your blog for your posts about wine. You haven’t written about wine in a month or more. What gives?
If I may ask, do you ever drink NY wines or are you still stuck in the California state of mind? What’s your opinion on riesling and gewurtzatraimer?
How about…
“Hey what a crab and Ho what a crab”
“Hey what a crab and Ho what a crab”
“Hey what a Hey what a Hey what a Crab”
“Heigh ho crabby crabby ho ho crab”
And if you ask my 9 year old about rum, he’d be happy to recommend Captain Morgan.
I am happiest when sipping on rum. White rum, especially. It’s probably the bad stuff, but it sits so well with me! Yaarr!
There is a cocktail for everybody. And there is a drink that specifically calls for Bacardi rum… by law.
Watch some English guy make it here.
Rum is quite nice. I like to pour it on certain cakes, a side effect of the Savarina we sell at Crisan (which I buy and take home at least three each time they are made, with hazelnut and such. Or sip it with, whatever.