Botran Ron Anejo Reserva Blanca from Casa Botran.  Botran are a rum producer from Guatemala home of course of Ron Zacapa.

The Reserva Blanca as can be seen from the photos is their white rum.  Botran Reserva Blanca is aged in lightly toasted ex-bourbon barrels before being filtered to remove the colour and produce a white rum.

It is aged in a Solera System.  Unfortunately, no information is given as to how long the rum is aged in this system.  I suspect it is likely to be 3 or less years.  As its Solera – overall it is probably quite a bit lower.

Botran like Zacapa talk about using Virgin Sugar Cane Honey in the production of their rums. This is one of the factors that is used in the recently established Ron de Guatemala PDO (a certificate stating what Guatemalan rum is). It also covers the use of the Solera System but to be honest it doesn’t really demand a great deal of the producers.  As it only reflects the work of two brands – Zacapa and Botran both from the same distillery I don’t think it does much really.  If we are being honest its just to give them another sticker to put on their labels in an attempt to elevate their rums.

Which is a bit of a shame because Botran – who laboratory tests have shown do use glycerin produce rums which are “relatively” clean tasting.  They are certainly not the worst of the Latin style producers.  So they could just let their rums speak for themselves – for what the Ron de Guatemala PDO is worth.  If you are interested in learning more then the website for this PDO is here.

Botran Reserva Blanca has recently began to be stocked in UK supermarket Marks and Spencer (M&S).  It retails at £25 for a 70cl bottle.  ABV of 40%. I’d tried it at a recent Rum Festival (I’ve been to a few of those lately) and found it quite tasty so I thought I would take a bottle home with me and see how we got on.  For me there is still nothing like walking into a physical store and walking out with a bottle of rum. Especially when it has £5 knocked off the price.  Receiving deliveries is exciting but nothing like that feeling.  God, I sound sad.  On that note lets get on with the fun part.

Botran Ron Anejo Reserva Blanca is crystal clear in the bottle and the glass. It’s clearly been filtered a fair bit to remove all the colour.

The nose is light and fruity. Notes of vanilla are overtaken by white grape and hints of pineapple and a little bit of sponge cake and icing sugar. There is a re-assuring amount of oak on the nose as well. It’s light and refreshing. Sweet but no overly so.

Sipped it reveals much of the barrel ageing than the nose had suggested. It’s actually pretty dry and spicy when taken neat. The sweetness on the nose is only briefly detected on the entry and it is quickly over taken by the spiciness of the oak. The finish is very short. This is a very dry, very quick to disappear rum when taken this way. Whilst it is not at all unpleasant it just doesn’t last very long.

Which is no surprise really as Botran have older rums in their range that are made for sipping. This is priced as a “Premium” mixer.

Despite its light and dry nature it doesn’t work badly with my mixer of choice – diet cola.  I suspect however it will work less well with a more sugar heavy regular cola. The fruitiness on the nose returns giving a refreshing and almost sherbet like flavour. There’s just enough flavour going on to keep the drink interesting.

Where Botran Reserva Blanca shines though is in lighter cocktails such as Daiquiri or even a Rum Sour. It works surprisingly well with lemonade and even soda water.

It’s not a huge in your face white rum like say a Jamaican Overproof, a Clairin or even an unaged Agricole but it does do what it sets out do very well. It offers a light, subtle and dry white rum which will no doubt be of great use in cocktails as mentioned above.

It doesn’t do anything remarkable but at the same time it doesn’t do much wrong. It’s enjoyable and easy going.