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| sadly I think I used my decent picture in an earlier post |
We might have
stumbled across something of a gem here. There I was, just calling into the
Trafford Centre to collect my sister’s birthday present, with a trip to Asda
for party wine and beer to follow, when I realised I had an uncertain quantity
of M&S vouchers in my wallet… that I was sure I could use to buy a bottle of tequila or a bottle of rum…
And so here we are,
with Plantation 3 Stars rum. It’s white
(or silver), a pleasing 41.2%, and blended by Cognac producer Pierre Ferrand
from rums distilled in Jamaica, Barbados and Trinidad. The Plantation range
consists of 12 expressions, ranging from this one at the bottom of the scale,
through rums of various vintages, ages and cask finishes that sound pretty
special and very tempting. It all began because Maison Ferrand would sell casks
that had contained Cognac to Caribbean rum producers for ageing their products,
and one day happened to discover some
very old batches that they decided to bottle.
According to the
producer’s website, this one begins with a 3-year aged Trinidad rum, which
is “carbon filtered to maintain its white colour and remove the heavier tannins
while preserving the aromatics developed and refined by aging”. Un-aged rums
from Barbados and Jamaica are then blended, along with a more expensive 12 year
old rum from Jamaica, which is said to be the key to the whole blend. “Trinidad
brings elegance and refinement, Barbados brings character and aromatics with
fruit notes without being too heavy and Jamaica brings the funk, the touch that
makes it a complete product.”
And that’s the most
marketing blurb you’re going to get out of me. I just thought it was quite
interesting, and that the producer said it better than I could.
Onto the evaluation;
I’ve never found rum particularly interesting before, but this brand has made
me think again. It helps that its strength exceeds 40%, but most importantly,
this is really tastey.
Even before I
realised a reputable cognac producer was behind this product, I could tell it
was going to be a little bit special from the presentation. The bottle looks
the part and is tastefully sealed. There’s maybe a little bit too much to read
on the label, but at least you know it has something to tell you. You probably
are surprised when you read that it was blended in France, but you also start
to think that this will turn out to be a good thing – after all, this wasn’t
a Lidl product, blended in Germany – I’d
just been to M&S, after all. Then you look on the internet and realise it
isn’t even a made for M&S product.
It’s actually all that stuff that I mentioned earlier in the article.
Sure, the £15 in
M&S vouchers and another £3 off helped make my mind up in regard to the
purchase – it was intended mostly for mojitos, in actual fact – but it
represents one of those watershed moments where I’ll resolve to get something
like this in future, instead of settling for something shit. It’s like tequila
in that respect; as soon as I tasted 100% agave and found that I could get it
fairly reliably for £20, I could see no sense in buying anything inferior ever
again – even for gratuitous mixing (a practice that takes place less and less
in my house these days). And I never did make any mojitos with it.
Not being one for detailed
tasting notes, I’ll just tell you, this is very sweet. Sweet, but full of
flavour. Cast your mind back to the last time you tried drinking Bacardi or one
of those supermarket white rums straight. Even though they are only 37.5% or
something like that, there’s little in the way of flavour there, it’s just
alcohol, for adding weight to your fruit juice or getting you hammered. This is
white rum you can actually sip. I didn’t think such a thing existed. But I’m
here to tell you, it does, and it’s worth your £25 if you’re in the market for
a new bottle that might surprise you.
And you don’t just
have to take my word for it. “Buy clever not expensive” says one user reviewer
on The Whisky Exchange, and never has a user review been more on the money.
Yes, it’s twice as expensive as your standard supermarket own brands and nearly
£10 more expensive than standard white rum brands such as Bacardi, but for £25,
you’re getting something that you can confidently call actual quality, and that’s probably a first for me in the genre of
rum – especially white rum.
Meanwhile, a user
review on Master of Malt says that there are only two white rums that can be
called amazing, and this is one of them. Even if there is only one other
amazing white rum out there (J Wray, apparently), I won’t be so quick to write
this genre off in future.
For my part, I took
this along with me to a party in Sheffield where it went down a treat with
everyone that tried it. They pretty much all said it was the best straight rum
they’d tried and that they would definitely buy it at £25 from M&S for
themselves. Now, some months later, whether they have done I don’t know. But I do
know I’ll be investing in another bottle soon. If you’re still not convinced,
remember I have already recognised this product in my 2015 Spirits of theYear. High praise indeed.
