This pot column blend from Appleton Estate in Jamaican gave us strong notes of brown sugar and wood, with subtler hints of caramel, cinnamon, pineapple, orange peel and glue.

Appleton Estate Signature, a blend of pot and column still rum from Appleton Estate in Jamaica bottled at 40% ABV, is simultaneously iconic and idiosyncratic. In terms of brand recognition among general consumers, Appleton Estate might be the most well known Jamaican distillery, and it’s Signature expression is a general purpose workhorse for many a tiki bar. And at the same time, it’s uniquely unrepresentative of Jamaican rum.

In the lab we measured it’s density to be 0.947g/cc, not indicative of any added sugar, which is unsurprising given Appleton’s general reputation for leaving their rums unadulterated (although interestingly, the back of their bottle says “…with no added flavours”, not “no additives”—is sugar a flavor?).

On the palate you’ll find very little of the bold, fruity profile Jamaican is known for. Instead there’s a mild brown sugar and subtle green apple. A suggestion of cask, but it’s certainly not beating you over the head with any age. On the palate there’s plenty of sweetness, accompanied by caramel, mild cinnamon, and a little pinapple and orange peel. The finish is very slight and nondescript, though you might pick out a bit of ginger.

In our blind taste test Appleton Estate Signature was pretty weak as a neat sipper (6.5/10) largely due to it’s limited complexity and flavor, but performed really well in a daiquiri (8.5/10); it played more of a supporting role as a mixer, but that’s not a bad thing if you need a do-it-all well rum. If you need a general purpose mixing workhorse with great availability, you could certainly do worse than Appleton Estate, but I wouldn’t recommend it as a synecdoche Jamaican rum as a whole.