This zero proof rum from Crystal gave us insanely strong notes of bubblegum and not much else. Perhaps this was a bit of peach.

The sadness of heading into dry January is not just that I must abstain from rum, but also that I must abstain from a certain amount of nerding-out about rum. It’s for this reason I got fairly excited when, while searching for zero-proof rums to try, I saw a reasonably priced bottle named for a bastion of rum excellence: Barbados! My excitement was tempered when I read the text just below the title: “Established in California”. Beyond the letdown that this was *not* somehow a white-labeled release from Mount Gay or Foursquare, I was further annoyed that even the California “established” designation wasn’t concrete (a small “Made in the USA” on the back is as close as we’ll get to a provenance). But let’s allow for the mention of Barbados as a statement of aspiration. What does it taste like? In a single word: bubblegum. It’s bubblegum on the nose, it’s bubblegum on the palate, it’s bubblegum on the finish, to the point it’s a bit surprising it’s not bright pink. In other words, I think a taste of this would probably kill Richard Seale. It’s label includes the tasting notes “subtly sweet”, “woody” and “smooth”; I’ll grant smoothness, but “subtly sweet” is understatement to the point of falsehood, and if there was any woodiness present it was lost on me. As a rum alternative, it misses the mark completely. But as a non-alcoholic bubblegum liqueur (if one is interested in such things), it can be quite nice. At our blind taste test, one participant who doesn’t drink much rum neat was delighted at the first in the lineup, precisely because it did not taste like rum. It made for a very idiosyncratic, but perfectly pleasant daiquiri. Sitting with the rum again I’m struck that a mea culpa may be in order. When selecting zero-proof rums to review this month I had only a few criteria: - It must be truly zero-proof - It must be clearly aimed at substituting for rum - It must not be a spiced or flavored offering In my excitement to taste an alcohol-free rum from Barbados, it was entirely lost on me that nowhere on the bottle does it mention being a “rum” or “cane spirit” alternative. But perhaps it’s a positive sign for the Certified Barbados Rum GI that I take Barbados to be synonymous with rum.