Ahh Mount Gay that “hilariously” named rum that often leads to a myriad of puerile double entendres and unfunny jokes.  Staple of Airport Duty Free’s and increasingly more and more present on the supermarket shelves in the UK.  More often than not discounted by a few pounds from its £18 price tag.

The rum has recently been relabelled, with Est 1703 and Barbados much more prominent than before.   The bottle has also been changed slightly.  Its quite an unusal bottle similar to a normal bar bottle but with a much flatter profile.  As with most rums readily available it has the usual metal screw top closure. Why are these so often red?

The rum itself is a standard golden rum similar in appearance to Appleton Special, Cockspur 5 star, Bacardi Gold and a whole host of other similarly priced entry level rums.  The presentation is fairly decent but it doesn’t jump out at you.

Mount Gay Eclipse is primarily a mixer.  Their website attests to this.  Whilst it recommends a simple serve of the Extra Old with ice it suggests cola with the Eclipse.

On the nose the rum has a quite sickly sweet smell.  It taste’s a little like this as well.  As this is a pot still rum this isn’t a surprise.  However, unlike the dunder heavy pot still rum’s of Jamaica the Eclipse lacks that funk and edge that the Jamaican rum’s have.  It’s stepping into the sticky sickly medicinal spirit like aroma’s of (dare I say it) Bundaberg.

Fortunately, when sipped the rum does not exhibit much of these sickly sweet flavours.  It’s just very heavy on the alcohol.  I wouldn’t even say it is particularly rough as such. Yes it burns and gives you a bit of a tingle and warms you but it doesn’t knock you backwards.  It’s not really for sipping.

When mixed as suggested the rum works okay but it certainly doesn’t add much to it.  My wife drinks vodka and when I asked her to try it she didn’t think there was much there other than alcohol.  I mix fairly liberally as well so its definitely not down to the measures.

There’s nothing wrong with this rum but there is nothing to write home about or get excited.  It’s just the same old standard cheap gold rum.

I buy the odd bottle when its on offer as its okay to get drunk with but its no sipper (I don’t think any claim has ever been made that it is).  To me its the Bacardi Superior of the Gold Rum world.  If you want a Bajan rum in this price bracket then Cockspur 5 star would be my first choice.

I’ll have to get around to trying their XO or even the newly released Black Barrel as I have heard they are a huge step up.