Your Top 3 smoothest Rum's

Asking for the top 3 smoothest rums is like asking a parent which of their five kids is their favorite. This is a frequent question from single malt scotch drinkers, but this is the first request for smoothest rums. To fully understand this, one must understand the distillation and aging process. Most rum is distilled from molasses, the by-product of refining sugar cane. Rhum agricoles from the French West Indies are made from sugar cane juice, but these are not for beginners. There are two types of distillation, pot stills and column stills. Pot stills produce funky flavors such as those from Jamaica and are not recommended for beginners. Column stills are much cheaper and produce smoother results. However, Bacardi uses column stills and I cannot recommend any of theirs. Then there is barrel aging. The bourbon and whiskey makers in the USA gladly have their charred oak barrels refurbished and sent to the Caribbean. The higher degree of charring, the more the rum will wind up tasting like bourbon or whiskey. I found that uncharred oak barrels produce the smoothest rums, with French oak being better than American oak. In the hot tropical climate of the Caribbean, rums reach maturity much faster, usually at about 8 years with 12 years being my maximum recommendation. However, there are no set rules for each country, so one will see Solera Aging on many rums. No telling what lurks in these bottles, but one can luck out and find good ones. For instance Ron Cartavio Solera 12 from Peru was downright repulsive on the first sip. I let it age in the snifter for an hour and it turned into one of the smoothest and best rums that I have had in a long time. So letting a rum breathe in the snifter can make almost any rum smooth tasting. My advice is to read the descriptions for various rums provided here by each company. Along with the advice I just gave, you should be able to narrow down your choices. Unfortunately, I do not have a column in my spreadsheet for type of barrel or type of still.

Thanks for all the information Paul I appreciate it.

Since you mentioned ED12, which is almost everyone's favorite rum, you should also like Diplomatico Reserva Exclusiva (often abbreviated as DRE in many reviews). There is a reason that DRE is the most popular rum on this site and ED12 is not too far behind. Both are sugar bombs and each have 30 gpl (grams per liter) of added sugar. You may also like Ron Zacapa 23, another sugar bomb that I had slowly grown to hate. I personally love ED12 and DRE, but they don't love me. Added sugar will bring on one hell of a hangover along with being bad for one's health. Food and drink makers add sugar as a tool to sell their product and it certainly worked for these three rums. Also, I found out the hard way that once a bottle of sugar bomb rum becomes less than half full, the rest will not last for four months. If you want a sweet rum with NO added sugar, try Dictador 12 from Columbia. The sweetness comes from the barrels that were used to age aguardiente (Columbian cachaca).

Well thanks again Paul...I am open to trying any quality rum and it doesn't have to be full of sugar, The ED12 just happened to go down very nice when I tried it. I'm looking for the smoothest most tasty rum and least amount of burn I can find with sugar or no sugar, with some help from all you rum expert's, I also may grow to hate the sugar filled rum's but like I said I'm new to the rum world so I appreciate all the info.

Anything from RL Seale(Foursquare Distillery) is awesome! All natural with no sugar added, non chill filtered and NO caramel color added! Don’t be afraid to try rums with a higher proof as many of them provide a smooth taste. Try rums from various islands because each has its own unique characteristics. Jamaican rum has its funk flavor from the use of Dunder in its fermentation wash, Cuban rum is a lighter rum due to its column still use where as Demerara rums from say Guyana represent a heavier, darker rum as a result of using pot stills. Agricole and Brazilian Cachaca use fresh cane juice providing a grassy, earthy smell and taste. Experiment and explore all the possibilities: molasses or sugar cane based, age, type of barrel used in aging( ex.Zinfandel, port, bourbon or Olorosso sherry), proof etc.

Thanks for sharing that knowledge I'm looking to try something different this weekend. The only problem here in Canada is there's not a real big selection of rum to try. Capitan Morgan and Bacardi seem to dominate the shelves

Yuk! I don’t care for Captain Morgan as their are so many far superior spice rums on the market like The Lash, Foursquare Spice, Bumbu and Brinley’s Shipwreck Spice providing all natural ingredients, flavors and colors. As for Bacardi goes, the only ones I believe are enjoyable are their 8 and Solera.

I can't help but enforce what Paul said. Avoid as the plague commercial brands like Bacardi or Cpt. Morgan's (unless you're mixing a cocktail, but even then, other commercial Rums like Zacapa or Matusalem might serve you better). Diplomatico and Eldorado 12 are fantastic, but I suggest you seek out others. Keep in mind that Agricòle (Rums by French Colonies) are drier and more similar to whisky, so avoid those.

on the natural side 1 Brugal 1888 (very little bite at all) 2 Doorly's xo 3 Cruzan Single barrel Slightly sweetened 1 El Dorado 8 2 Matusalem 18 3 Santa Teresa 1796 ...Just to name a few Cheers! 🥃

DRE Santa Teres 1796 Plantation XO Special mention to Admiral Rodney and Flor de Caña 18. Being from BC, Canada I too find it really hard to locate/ purchase unique producers. There seem to be a few in AB, plenty out east, but little to less than little. So many others I keep reading about here, and putting on my wish list to find one day.

Hey Shaner, as some folks said picking either ‘smoothest’ or ‘favourite’ rums is a tough one - especially since more experienced raters go for flavors they like best not necessarily how smooth a rum is. That said, one rum that hasn’t been mentioned which my wife loves because it’s smooth is Zaya. I think they’ve changed the recipe recently, but historically I think Zaya has been quite a smooth rum considering the reasonable price.

Plantation 20th Anniversary XO

To add to Tom's point about flavors, in my experience when people like the flavors in a rum they tend to notice the burn less. Something to consider in these answers.

The perceived "smoothness" of alcohol like rum is often correlated to the following: * how light/heavy the rum is. The more a rum contains other volatile compounds that passed through the distillation that are not ethanol, the heavier it is by definition. These other non-ethanol compounds are called "cogeners", and some of them are strictly unwanted guests responsible for hangover and off-flavors, and some of them are highly prized for all those funky/earthy/fruity flavors that give rums complexity. The more perfect the distillation process is, the lighter is the distillate, so if you want light rums, you will want column still distillates distilled to high ABV. If the distillation is too perfect, the resulting product loses all character and cannot be called rum any longer - it becomes a vodka. The thing is that "smoothness" goes directly against "character and complexity" - one grows at the expense of the other. Luckily for you, smoothness is relatively easy to achieve by technological means. * how much sugar, glycerol and other additives the distillate contains - like monosodium glutamate in cooking, sugar and glycerol can mask flavor defects in alcohol and alter the mouthfeel, contributing significantly to how smooth she alcohol feels when drunk. The distillers know it and use them whenever they can get away with it. * how strong the alcohol is - weaker alcohol does not "scratch" in the throat (if you go far enough, water is super smooth ;-), which is why unscrupulous bottlers and blenders often bottle their rums with far lower ABV than declared - I have seen even bottles that contained as little as 28 percent ABV instead of declared 40, but in practice, 40 often goes to the 33 - 35 territory. The result? Super smooth rum, happy customers, and significant costs saved, because alcohol is much more expensive than water! To sum it up, I propose you an experiment - buy a bottle of barrel aged vodka like Starka, or Absolut Oak, add simple syrup according to taste (simple syrup is mixture of sugar and water 1:1 for quick dilution in drinks), and dilute the whole thing to about 30 - 35% abv, add a bit of food caramel to achieve darker, more "aged" and exquisite look (those elaborate bottles from French cognacs work well), and offer it to your friends. You will see they will be in high heaven - you can tell them that it's a remainder of forgotten casks from a sunk pirate ship that were so good that the captain did not want to enter the lifeboat and sunk with them, and you will create a tasting experience your friends won't ever forget!