Sibling Rivalry Part Deux!

Appleton Estate Rum, 8-Year, 12-Year, and 15-Year Old
Classification: Jamaica Rum
Country: Jamaica
Region: Nassau Valley (St. Elizabeth: 18.166N, -77.728W)
Mash Bill: Fermented Molasses
Strength: 43% ABV (86° Proof)
Color: Unknown (most likely artificial color)
Filtration: Unknown
Maturation: 8 Years, 12 years, and 15 years respectively in ex-bourbon American oak
Price: 8-Year: $27.99, 12-Year: $34.99, 15-Year: $65.99

Tl;dr summary - Three rums, each one progressively older than its predecessor. Kudos to the folks at Appleton - the progression from youngest to oldest is very much in keeping with expectations. As the age increases, so too do the vanilla, oak, and roasty-toasty notes while simultaneously the fruit notes diminish. The 8-year is the most spirit-forward whereas the 15-year is the most oak-forward. It’s the 12-year that remains the sweet-spot to my tastes, a great balance between age and fruit.

Well, well, well, what have we here? Inspired by Thanksgiving Week Vacation Cocktail numero uno, I realized it was long overdue to spotlight rum on my little slice of the Interwebz. Despite being featured in numerous cocktail recipes here, rum has never starred on the big stage of an impressions writeup. In fact, this is the first impression entry featuring a spirit other than whiskey. Considering this milestone, let’s go for the gusto and make it a trio of rums, all hailing from the same distillery, Jamaica’s Appleton Estate.

The rum world is a fascinating place. Unlike major whiskey varieties like scotch, bourbon, or Irish whiskey, there is no uniform set of regulations governing the production of rum. While I will not attempt to iterate through the global spiderweb of rum regulations in this post, I will tell you that rum purchases generally require far more consumer due diligence to decipher and deduce what exactly is in that bottle of rum you are purchasing. There are two especially nefarious practices to be aware of in the rum world - misleading (or outright bogus) age statements and whether additives such as sugar or flavorings are added to the rum after distillation. Sadly, many rum producers are legally allowed to place misleading age statements as well as add additional sugar and/or flavorings to their rum without disclosing as such on their label. Thankfully Appleton Estate does the honorable thing here and does not covertly add any additional sugar or flavorings to their rums and the age statements found on their respective labels is the age of the youngest rum in the bottle.

As hinted in the King of Barbados entry, Jamaican rums are renowned for their ‘funk’ and while the ins and outs of ‘funk’ in rums is beyond the scope of this post, the executive summary is that funk in a Jamaican rum tends to be aromas (and tastes) of overripe fruits, particularly banana. Also know that funk in rums is not the exclusive purview of Jamaica, many rum producing nations across the globe produce ‘funky’ rums. Still, it is the rums from Jamaica that are most recognized as funky, perhaps due to the immense exposure they receive from their inclusion in many of the legendary cocktails emanating from tiki culture. One final funk note - while Appleton Estate certainly brings some funk, it must be stated that on the scale of funkadelic, Appleton is on the lighter side. Other Jamaican distilleries such as Hampden Estate or Worthy Park bring the Parliament-Funkadelic to the bottle and are definitely worth seeking out and sampling if Appleton floats your boat.

Appleton has offered a 12-year version for as long as I can remember and it has been a staple on our shelf since I first discovered it. The 12-year is on the very short list of rums that I recommend without hesitation to anyone that asks. It can be enjoyed neat, over ice, or as a mixer. Appleton 8-year is a ‘new’ item in their lineup, having been discontinued a number of years ago, but brought back in the summer of 2021. Along with the 8-year, the 15-year made its debut in Appleton’s lineup in 2021 and serves as a fitting layover point between the 12-year and their ultra-aged 21-year old offering.

All of Appleton Estate’s rum begins life as fermented molasses. To distill all that fermented molasses, Appleton employs both column stills as well as double-retort pot stills. While column stills are familiar to most whiskey enthusiasts as they are used the world over to produce a wide variety of distilled spirits, it's the double-retort pot still that brings a bit of razzmatazz to the party. Essentially an ingenious innovation stringing together multiple pot stills to allow simultaneous double and even triple distillation, double-retort pot stills were born from a desire to improve efficiency, but now serve as a vehicle to deliver a ester-rich ethanol prized by many Caribbean-based rum producers. If interested, a deeper dive into the anatomy and chemistry of the double-retort can be found here. Once distilled, Appleton uses ex-bourbon barrels (allegedly ex-Jack Daniel’s barrels) for the bulk of their aging duties with all aging occurring in the year-round heat of Jamaica. The journey to the bottle is completed when Appleton’s blenders select both column distilled and the double-retort pot distilled rums to be blended together and proofed to produce the final product. And speaking of final product, let's get to tasting three of them:

Appleton 8-Year

Nose: Molasses, brown sugar, gentle funk, orange zest, banana

Taste: Gentle alcohol bite, medium sweetness, fruit/banana sweetness, gentle chili and baking spice

Finish: Moderate ethanol, short length, gentle oak, brown sugar, banana, molasses

Overall: If one made a pie chart detailing the characteristics of this rum, the largest slice would be ethanol (youthful spirit), then brown sugar, then fruit. The Jamaica funk is not as pronounced as I’d like and I personally get more brown sugar notes in the taste but more molasses notes in the finish. An excellent mixing rum, but not a sipping rum for me.

Appleton 12-Year

Nose: Ripe Banana, funk, chocolate, orange, cinnamon, vanilla

Taste: Mild alcohol bite, medium-low sweetness (less sweet than the 8-year), orange, bitter orange, cinnamon, nutmeg

Finish: Medium-short in length, cinnamon and nutmeg, molasses, the slightest wisp of oak

Overall: The fruit and funk are several notches higher when compared to the 8-year. The molasses remains hidden until the finish where it just starts to peek through the blanket of fruit and spice. There is oak, but it is ever so gentle. A true jack of all trades, this rum is enjoyable neat or mixed.

Appleton 15-Year

Nose: A surprising punch of ethanol, more than the 12-year but less than the 8-year. Almost zero funk and very faint fruit. Roasted nuts, coffee, and oak char. Molasses is more pronounced on the nose than the 8-year and 12-year.

Taste: Vanilla syrup, molasses, oak char. Moderately sweet initially then progresses to a drying finish with light tannins

Finish: Oak, molasses, medium length. Given its lofty age statement, my expectation is for a much longer finish, but what is there is enjoyable

Overall: The oak is the most pronounced element of this rum, leading to a drying finish. Unlike the 8-year and 12-year, the molasses is most noticeable in the 15-year particularly in the finish. What is surprising and disappointing to me is the diminished amount of fruit and funk in this rum. While this is a sipping rum through and through, it certainly could be used in cocktails but that feels overly extravagant at this price-point. For my rum-purchasing dollars, the 15-year will be a one-and-done purchase as it does not rival the 12-year to my tastes. 

Final Verdict

The Appleton 8-year is an honorable entry in the lineup. Its current price, flirting with $30, while a notch high, is partially justified by a legitimate age-statement and a 3% bump in ABV over virtually all of its competitors. The rum certainly tastes youthful, more youthful than its stated 8-years, but this too can be interpreted as a positive as the rum mixes beautifully. There is no doubt this is a molasses based rum with a gentle Jamaican funk, it's a straightforward rum, so long as you do not have sipping aspirations for it. Things get a bit more interesting when it comes to the 12 and 15-year entries. 

I purchased the 15-year almost five months ago and since that day, I've debated labeling it as disappointing. Ultimately, I shall not do so as the connotation of that word is disproportionately harsh to the rum sitting in that bottle. While the 15-year is not a disappointing rum, it is an outmatched rum, specifically by its three year younger brother. Sampling these three rums simultaneously highlighted precisely what I desire from an Appleton rum - first and foremost I want fruit, then funk, then molasses, and lastly oak influence. Across the 7-year age difference between these three rums, as they get older, the spirit-influence decreases, the fruit-influence decreases, and the oak influence increases. Oddly, as far as the funk goes, it's strongest in the 12-year, then the 8-year, and weakest in the 15-year. Like the fruit influence, I would have expected the funk to diminish proportionally with age, but alas, that is not the case to my tastes. Perhaps the funk prevalence in the 12-year is an intentional artifact of the blender's intentions. I can only speculate on that, but ultimately, that is precisely why I adore the 12-year, it is a brilliant balance between fruit, funk, and age.

Stay funky my friends, until next time.

A hard day at the office...