el ron añejo

Here is a bottle of rum that is older than I am. I'm not sure exactly how old it is—I suspect it's around 28 or 29, possibly 30. In any case, it's way past its quarter-centennial.

Last week I threw this dinner party, and copious amounts of alcohol were consumed. Digging back into my experience working in a bar during university days, I cast about for interesting drinkables beyond the vodka+mixer varieties. 

Perhaps it would have been better to have drunk the rum straight up, but the daiquiris made with this were a big hit. They're so tasty and so easy to make I can't believe we didn't polish off the entire bottle. Then again, we'd already worked our way through a number of B-52s, a few rounds of Cosmopolitans and some freakishly addictive White Russians by the time I found the rum.

Side note: I always shake my White Russians with ice before straining, though I know the drink is usually just built in the glass. It just tastes so much better. The drink is chilled without having the ice sit in it and diluting it, and it gives the drink this delightful frothy mouthfeel.

Anyway, so: the rum. Slightly unorthodox, making daiquiris with dark rum, but I basically just slung some ice cubes in a shaker, generous tot of the rum, brown sugar (how come you taste so good), lime juice. And then shake it vigorously until fingers feel numb from the cold and the shaker is frosted all along its surface. Crack it open, strain into glass, little bit of Cuba in your life.