San Diego: Bali Hai

[Phischy]

So this joint sells rum and has a pretty amazing rum list. I go in about 1x a week an order a 10 Cane Mai Tai, usually a Tues or Thurs when it's dead and the bartenders are bored.

So I'm on my 2nd Tai and I order a Caruzen Black Strap rum. 8 year I think, the barkeep tells me "I hope you like pancake syrup" and sure enough, it is thick and tastes just like syrup! Interesting.

He then pours me an Angstrosa (same company that makes bitters) that was high on vanillia and was a bit 'hot'. And finally since we were chatting he pours me a 20yr old Haitian Rum. I expect this to be 'the bomb'. And it bombed all right...smelled like turpintine and tasted worse. He says "I don't know how they make it, but nothing good comes out of Haiti"

really...like I need to get into another expensive spirit other than Bourbon. But this place is neat, georgous views of downtown and fantastic rum drinks. Their bourbons are Bullit, Makers, Knob.

[cowdery]

One thing I can tell you about the Haitian rum is that it probably was not 20 years old in the way we normally understand aging. In Jamaica, for examply, a 20-year-old rum is like a 20-year-old bourbon or scotch--every rum in the bottle is at least 20 years old. In Haiti they use a different system that I don't understand, but the gist of it is that at least some of the rum in the mix is at least 20 years old, but not all of it. This is also true of most Central and South American rums.

[Phischy]

I think it may have been an ounce of 20yr old rum and the rest was kerosene. Crap was horrible.

[robbyvirus]

I've gotten into rums a bit lately, and I've found that different rums really vary widely in taste...much more so than between bourbons. There are some rums, especially from the Carribean, that have a distinctive taste that indeed reminds me of kerosene...I don't like those at all. Yet there are others that taste like molasses, or syrup, that I find delicious. My favorite that I've found recently is a 12-year old rum called Zaya, and it's from Guatemala. Really, really tasty stuff!

[Phischy]

I"ve a bottle of Zaya at home, great stuff. Avoid Pyrat...it was pretty dissappointing.