Mount Gay 1703 Black Barrel Rum was introduced in 2014. It is comprised of a blend of rums produced from both pot and column still distillation and aged in heavily charred bourbon barrels. According to the Mount Gay Distillery Master Blender, Allen Smith the Black Barrel Rum was specifically blended to give rum enthusiasts the best of two worlds:
“We actually launched Mount Gay Black Barrel in 2013 to give drinkers a complex premium rum that they could enjoy as a sipping rum or by mixing in cocktails, and it has become one of our most popular rums. It’s a small batch, handcrafted blend that has a balanced, but bold spicy flavor.”
Here is a link to my full review of Allen Smith’s Black Barrel Rum:
Review: Mount Gay 1703 Black Barrel Rum
Please enjoy my review which concludes with two very nice recipe suggestions, The Black Storm, and Crimson Cane.
Chimo
Things came together for this cocktail when I received a sample of Mount Gay’s Black Barrel Rum. The thought occurred to me that the complexity of Mount Gay Rum parallelled the complexity of Scotch Whisky. Would it be possible I wondered, to swap out not only Cherry Heering for Wisnak na Rumie, but also to swap out Scotch Whisky for Mount Gay Black Barrel Rum.
1703 is a significant year in the world of rum. That is because this was the year that Mount Gay Rum was first produced on the Isle of Barbados which makes Mount Gay Rum one of the oldest, if not the oldest brand of rum in the world. Because Barbados is situated as a gateway from the Atlantic to the Caribbean, sailors from the Old World often used the island as the first resting point on the way to the New World. This meant Barbados was ideally suited for trade between the two worlds in the eighteenth and nineteenth century. Part of that trade was rum which is why the island is considered the birthplace of the rum trade.
The Rum Howler Blog 