Bacardi Carta Fuego Superior Spiced Rum

Carta Fuego is Bacardi's spiced offering, a young Puerto Rican molasses rum bottled at 40% and aimed at simple, sweet mixing. Column-distilled at Bacardi's vast operation, it is lightly aged and then flavoured, so it sits squarely in the spiced-rum category rather than alongside aged sipping rums.

The nose shows vanilla, cinnamon, honey and spice, while the palate brings caramel, spice, sugar and a candied edge with noticeable sweetness. The finish is brown sugar and spice, short and a touch sharp. This is an honest mixer: the sweetness and warming spice are the whole proposition, and it does its job in cola or a juice-based cocktail. Drinkers who sip neat and look for depth or a long finish will want to look elsewhere, but for an easy, sweet rum-and-coke it serves its purpose.