The Best Silver Rums

Produced at Destilería Serrallés in Ponce, Puerto Rico, Don Q Cristal is a molasses-based rum distilled using a five-column still system, with fermentation carried out using a proprietary yeast strain that dates back over 75 years. Aged one and a half to five years in American white oak ex-bourbon barrels before being charcoal filtered for clarity. Bottled at 80 proof.

Named for an area at the foot of the Andes Mountains in Venezuela, Planas is produced at Destilerías Unidas and is a blend of pot still, column still, and batch kettle rums aged up to six years before being charcoal filtered for clarity. It replaced the brand's Blanco expression and is bottled at 92 proof.

J Wray & Nephew is a renowned overproof rum produced in Kingston, Jamaica weighing in at 126 proof. Wray & Nephew, as it's known behind bars, is not only a very popular spirit in its home country, but is also the top-selling high-strength rum in the world. It is produced from a combination of both pot and column distillations of a 30 hour fermentation of sugarcane molasses wash and proprietary house yeast.

The first-ever white rum from Plantation is named for three rum-producing “stars” of the Caribbean: Barbados, Jamaica and Trinidad. The blend features unaged rums from Barbados and Jamaica, a 3-year-old rum from Trinidad and a 12-year Jamaican rum. Each rum brings their respective island’s distinctive flavors and characteristics to the blend, from the lighter, refined Trinidadian rum to the funkier, full-bodied Jamaican rums. Any color from the aging process has been removed via carbon filtration before bottling.

Bayou Rum is the brainchild of Louisiana Spirits founders Tim and Trey Litel and Skip Cortese, who sought to bring back the lost art of local rum production. To make Bayou, they use a mixture of Louisiana sugarcane molasses and raw sugar from M.A. Patout and Son, Ltd. The white is a pot-still rum with triple-filtered spring water, bottled unaged.

From Foursquare Distillery in Barbados comes this aged and filtered white rum bottled for the Real McCoy--a company founded by a documentary filmmaker whose research into the famed rum runner led him to found his own rum brand.

A joint project between Foursquare Rum Distillery in Saint Philip, Barbados and Hampden Estate in Trelawny, Jamaica, Probitas combines unaged pot still rum from Hampden Estate with an unaged Coffey still rum and a two year old pot still rum, both from Foursquare. Bottled non-chill filtered at 94 proof with no added sugar, flavoring, or coloring.

Jamaica’s Hampden Estate is a centuries-old distillery famous for making the funkiest, hogo-monster rums on the planet in their entirely pot-still distillery. Although the same color and ABV as the better known Wray & Nephew Overproof, the two rums have fairly different flavor profiles; in this case, “mouth on fire” does not qualify as a flavor profile. This rum reaches out of the glass to kick sand in the face of other high-ester rums.

Banks Rum is named for the botanist Sir Joseph Banks, an adventurer who sailed with Captain Cook in the mid 18th century. The 5 Island blend is composed of 21 rums from 5 different islands - Trinidad, Jamaica, Guyana, Barbados, and Java, each lending their own unique style, flavors and character. The final formula was created by Master Blender Arnaud de Trabuc, who uses a combination of pot-stilled and column-stilled rums, charcoal filtered for clarity.