Balcones Texas Rum

Balcones is a Texas distillery best known for its whiskies, and this pot still rum carries that house style straight across. Built from molasses and matured in whisky casks, it is bottled unsweetened at a hefty 58.5 percent, a bold, oak driven rum that drinks far more mature than its roughly two years of ageing would suggest.

The hot Texas climate drives fast extraction, and the result is intense and tannic rather than sweet. The nose shows nuts, oak, honey and tobacco, the palate brings dark cherry, cassis, molasses, roasted nuts and big wood, and the finish stays woody with vanilla, oak and caramel. A dry, slightly funky, animalic edge runs underneath, and it is unmistakably Balcones in character. This is one for whisky drinkers and oak lovers, best sipped neat or with a few drops of water rather than mixed, a punchy, characterful crossover rum.