In my first post, I mentioned that rums surely will appear here on the blog. So much so that I have already dedicated one of my few articles to this topic.
I have been interested in rums since last summer. The past year was enough for me to get to know and love them. From the beginning, my goal was to consume rum as I did wines before. Feel and enjoy how it affects all my senses.
It’s important to state two things at the beginning: I’m not a trained rum reviewer, I don’t know spirits. However, while I was in the grape-wine industry (higher education), I participated in not one wine competition as a judge. I acquired the basics while I was a student, then as a teacher we sometimes held organoleptic tests daily (no, it wasn’t just about drinking). So I have some idea about it. At the same time, rum is a completely different product, the two drinks are heaven and earth. I still have a lot to learn. That’s why I try to present the individual items in the way they affect me, what I feel, trying not to evaluate, just to give a sense of what to expect if someone hasn’t tasted it yet, but would like to try it. Describing what I liked and what I didn’t like, but not exalting or trampling on the tasted drink. We’ll see if I can live up to my own expectations. (If it doesn’t work out, I apologize to you and to myself. And of course to those who worked hard to get the drink from the sugarcane plantation to the glass!)
Due to these reasons I don’t plan to purchase higher-priced rums for the time being – I am afraid that, due to my lack of training, I would not be able to adequately evaluate and properly treat the given bottle. For this reason, I am currently aiming for a lower price point (possibly the bottom of the middle) and am guided by two features: it should preferably be in a small package (in fact, as small as possible) – so that if it doesn’t taste good, I don’t feel like I bought it unnecessarily. On the other hand, I try to stay under HUF 20,000 per item (EUR ~50). By combining the two, I could buy tasting quantities – there are foreign online stores where I can buy 2/4/5 cl samples at a reasonable price. But there is also a third criterion: I can buy what I taste in Hungary. Just so that if you feel that you need the rum you read, you can buy it. This does not rule out the fact that I will not order from abroad in the future, but this is not important at the moment. What is, however, is that precisely because of my lack of knowledge on the subject, my choices are very intuitive. I rarely buy something because of its description (especially its origin or production technology). Most of the time, my attention is drawn to the bottle and the label, which obviously doesn’t say anything about the contents, let alone my preferences.
Finally, why de gustibus? Because what I like, you may not like, and vice versa. So why this whole thing? Let’s say: I’ll taste it so you don’t have to do it anymore – only if you want after all.