Original Soggy Dollar Old Dark Rum. The Soggy Dollar is a bar situated in the British Virgin Isles, Jost Van Dyke isle to be exact. It is perhaps most famous for it’s claim to be the original creators of the famed Pusser’s Painkiller cocktail. You can read a little more on that story here.

The Soggy Dollar bar started life as a six seat beach bar which was only really accessible by boat. You could also try swimming to the sandy beach in White Bay where the bar is housed. Hence the term “Soggy Dollar” as your dollars got soggy on the swim over. The bar is still a popular tourist attraction and has its own site complete with a webcam. So you can see the daily goings on at the bar. If you are into that kind of thing.

Original Soggy Dollar Old Dark Rum is available here in the UK at around £30 a bottle. Amazon and Master of Malt currently stock it. They also have a Spiced variant. It is “a handcrafted custom blend of select regional aged rums from across the Caribbean; triple distilled from cane sugar molasses and aged in American old oak casks”. This of course from the rums own website. Which sadly doesn’t give me much information on the actual rums. I’ll come to that later.

It is bottled at a standard 40% ABV. They also have an Island Spiced Rum available in similar packaging but with a slightly different colour scheme. The bottle is actually quite nice 3/4 size stubby bottle with a short neck and a nice chunky synthetic cork stopper. The glass is engraved with some detailing about the Soggy Dollar Bar. It looks quite premium for the price point it is at.

I’ve not tried a rum from the British Virgin Isles – for a while Pusser’s Rum was bottled theere. Cruzan is the closest I have come hailing from the neighbouring US Virgin Isles. I did review their Single Barrel a good while back. However, it is worth noting that this a Caribbean rum rather than one made solely from rum produced in the BVI. At least that’s what the bottle and marketing leads me to believe anyway…….

The nose is light and authentic. I’m getting an admittedly mostly column distilled type of lighter Caribbean rum but I am not nosing anything “suspicious” which might suggest additives of any kind. It’s clean and light with a nice balance of toffee, vanilla and some quite “fresh” smelling oak spices and a touch of nutmeg and ginger.

It’s not particularly punchy or hefty but it’s a nicely balanced nose that doesn’t do much wrong to be fair. It doesn’t smell particularly old – I’d guess around 3-5 maybe lower in terms of the overall blend. It’s honest enough though and it isn’t a particularly pricy rum.

Sipped it’s a little rougher around the edges and it shows a fair bit of youth on the first sip. It’s fierier than the nose suggests with a slightly bitter edge to it and a fair hit of wood and oak spices. It has a slightly perfumed tastes as well particularly once the wood and fiery alcohol on the sip begin to fade.

Overall it tastes quite young, 3 year old tops for this and I would suggest it likely has a high proportion of quite young column distilled rum either from Angostura or Cruzan. It’s not awful and it maintains a decent “rummy” profile, particularly with the woody notes but it isn’t hugely flavourful.

As a sipper it’s all just a bit to short. The initial sip and mid palate are brief and the finish? Well, it’s a blink and you miss it showing. It just quickly fades from light perfume and a touch of vanilla to pretty much nothing but a slow burn of alcohol and woody bitterness.

Whilst this rum is a bit rough and ready it is saved by its general “lightness” – it tempts at being quite aggressive on the initial sip but it’s very much like a yappy dog in that it’s bark is far worse than it’s bite. It just sniffs at your trouser leg and can barely make a mark in your jeans.

Quite what the actual components are in this rum? I’m not sure quite what the “triple distillation” has added is lost on me. It’s probably dulled the flavours a fair bit. It sounds good when used in Vodka terminology but it’s a big turn off for any flavourful spirit that doesn’t rely on tasting of nothing.

It’s likely some of the rum in the bottle will come from Cruzan Distillery based at St Croix, US Virgin Isles. I’d also suggest maybe some Barbados and Trini rum is in there. Beyond that, I doubt there is any Jamaican or any kind of real Pot Still heavy rum or blend. It’s all just very column like. Light and a little sweet.

As a mixer it is a okay for a £30 rum but in fairness there are many equals at a lower price point and quite competent sippers available for just a few pounds more.

If it were £20 it might be worth the occasional splurge but at £30 it is overpriced. It’s not a bad little rum but it’s pretty average and I won’t be be buying it.