So. I was getting pretty sceptical about the whole Mai Tai thing – I’d tried it with the admittedly lackluster rums I had on hand and it seemed to me rather inferior to a daiquiri – the almond and orange weren’t really doing much, the lime needed taming, and I’d got used to caipirinhas, which have floral sugarcane notes to deal with any limey harshness.
Then my Lost Spirits Polynesian-inspired rum arrived. So I had another go.
Wow. Now I get it. No 2-rum mix, just “Polynesian.”
2 rum
1 lime
3/4 monin orgeat
1/2 grand marnier
#illadvisedcocktails
Tattered Remains of Tartary 
Since I have no pseudo-Polynesiana, my vaguely-African brass giraffe is standing in. She’s needed because frankly, this is not an impressive-looking drink. But the flavour! So a caipirinha is all about the spicy, crunchy, unrefined sugarcane flavour. This, though – the rum is very clearly made of molasses when you taste it on its own. In the mix, it loses most of its burn, and its fruity notes become this complex but refined, sweet but not cloying, fresh but will definitely get you drunk kinda thing.
Seriously, though: I had no idea how lame my Mount Gay rum was. Pfeh.
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[tips hat] Good job. Hopefully you’re basking in the afterglow of your successful hunting-down of a good rum and of refining your recipe. My hat is off to you, sir. That is disappointing about the other rums, but you’ll probably find a use for them.
I’m noticing a thing about the Jamaican rums I’ve been having. There’s a not-unpleasant afterburn of sorts, where I can taste, say, the Appleton 12 or the Smith & Cross the next day. WRT Myers’s, I liked Myers’s a lot before having other Jamaicans, and it was distinctive at the time. But now, it doesn’t even seem like a Jamaican. Oh well. Too bad.
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