An elegant, vintage-style bottle makes you take notice of Caliche, but it’s her distinctive flavor that makes her unforgettable. This white rum registers a notch or two above the rest for me primarily because it’s aged. White rums generally aren’t, of course, their time not spent maturing in a barrel explaining their crystal-clear color. Caliche, on the other hand, is actually comprised of a blend of four different aged rums. There’s three, four, and five year-old rums in this triumph, plus a small amount of Solera-aged rum to add what Caliche calls “a particular character aroma and depth.” No argument here, though what really stands out about this product of Puerto Rico is its smoothness and crisp, clean flavor, a product of its quintuple distillation and charcoal filtration to remove color. The result, a truly pleasant, easy-drinking white rum with nice hints of oak and vanilla. I like Caliche on the rocks with lemon or lime, and it also makes a mean mojito, more robust than the traditional version made with Havana Club Tres Años.
An Uncommon Guide to Uncommon White Rums
