ctbeck11
Plantation Barbados 5 Year Rum
Aged Rum — Barbados
Reviewed
September 28, 2021 (edited November 10, 2021)
Nose - light molasses, sweet floral notes, vanilla, orange, cinnamon, pineapple, banana, honey, coconut, grass, mint, mild to moderate ethanol burn.
Taste - light molasses, orange pith, grass, honey, allspice, mint, pineapple, banana, sour apple, sweet floral notes, mild to moderate alcohol bite, finishing medium short with light molasses, bitter citrus, and grassy mint flavors.
Another cheap Plantation offering, but is it better than the 3 Stars I reviewed yesterday? The nose certainly has more depth than its white rum relative. It’s less like an agricole and more like a prototypical rum. Molasses, tropical fruit, citrus, and honey. The palate is sweet, sour, and bitter with many of the same qualities as the nose.
Overall this is a small step up from the 3 Stars as a sipper, but it’s no stud. It’s markedly less funky as well. The profile isn’t very different from the Bacardi 8 Year’s, and I enjoy it about the same. I haven’t devoted much time to finding drink matches for it, but may consider swapping this with 3 Stars if it holds up well to the standard cocktails I make at home.
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@ctbeck11 keep doin’ you. Your reviews are accurate an informative. Your take just had me thinking, which is a great feaugure of this platform. Have always had a high opinion of the 5-year as affordable entry point to quality aged rums, but definitely lacks a little character that I’m after these days, and I have been recognizing that mixing a rum with barrel influence is a more niche pursuit than a young one that just wants to splash around with fruit juice all day.
@bigwhitemike Good point. And I bet you’re right that the 5 Year would make for an inferior mixer even if it’s better neat. This exposes one of the known shortcomings of my review style, which only assesses the spirits at face value (neat, or in some rare occasions, with a few drops of water). I like that it standardizes the reviews, insofar as subjective experience can be standardized, but it disregards the intended purpose of the product by design. I try to call this out in the reviews when the situation arises, but this probably explains why my score is lower on the 3 Star than many other reviewers’, despite having similar opinions about it.
@cascode Yep. Unfortunately I’ve collected too many of those over the past couple years.
Good review and agree with your observations. Is likely a better sipper, but on a whole, I would prefer to have the 3-star in my cabinet as it’s much more versatile. The sweetness plus barrel characteristics relegates this to being just boring - gentle sweet vanilla and not much more, like a 60 proof bourbon.
2.5 sounds just about right for this very average rum.