Kraken Spiced Rum

[TheRealMrMessy]

Interested too, Kraken is very much enjoyed locally in this house... End of July I'll have 50L of rum at 90% up to dunder generation 8 (assuming the last two finish as smoothly as the last 6!). Gonna fill a 25L US Oak with 65% and be looking to experiment with some of the rest.

[WoodyD40]

You are going to be approx 4 weeks ahead of me. But I’d like to try doing some kraken spiced rum too

[TheRealMrMessy]

I reckon in a few months (need to age the rum a tiny bit), I wanna try a blind comparison: (1) Kraken; (2) MacRum with Linny's recipe; (3) MacRum with some of the Still Spirits Dark Spiced Essence; (4) Vodka (the wheat-ish one I'll kick off next) with Still Spirits Dark Spiced Essence.

The MacRum, think I'll hold some Gen 4 for that purpose before I blend my generations - youngest I've got noting the commentary about being a fairly light rum base in the thread. I also haven't had kraken in a good 6 months plus at this point, so I should be right to make a decent read on the others on their own merits as well as by comparison...

In fact know what, I'll go chuck a couple litres on oak right now. Will still be rough around the edges, but flavour is the question mark right now :handgestures-thumbupleft: .

[TheRealMrMessy]

1.75 @65% with 18g medium toast USA with around a medium char. Will come back to this when I'm all set to try this out haha.

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[WoodyD40]

my first mcRum is now 12 months old aged on french ... its really really good.

[TheRealMrMessy]

Still on track to try all this out around end of September - that's when I'll have some neutral (FFV) to mix up the SS dark rum essence and compare the Gen 4 rum with the spice blend, and with the dark rum essence in some as well. Got all the spices/botanicals etc ready to roll.

The little bottle of gen 4 will be 9 weeks on dominoes, gonna be rough but eh... science experiment!

[TheRealMrMessy]

Alright, we're rolling on this. Got 1L of 42% gen 4 macrum with:
2 vanilla beans (taking Linny's cue that he adds 3 caps of vanilla, and I had two beans on hand - so its technically a 4x strength)
1 small cinnamon stick
1/16th tsp nutmeg.
5 days in I'll add an inch of orange peel (Linny reckoned 7 was too long)
7 days in I'll add 2 whole cloves and 2 points of star anise.
3 days later I'll filter it off.

Got a 1L of same gen 4 42% sitting with the appropriate amount of still spirits dark spiced rum essence in it, and got my first vodka spirit run this weekend, an FFV so should have a hint of wheat to it. I'll make up 1L of neutral with the dark spiced rum essence. Also got a little under 500ml of the gen 4 42% that'll be unmodified, just so I've got a baseline.

Come back to this in a few more weeks when its all had chance to blend and mellow/settle from the process.
:obscene-drinkingchug:

[TheRealMrMessy]

Just added the star anise and cloves, took pic, then gave it a good shake. Smells good so far!

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[RuddyCrazy]

Well after tasting Woodies rum the other weekend I have taken it off my hate bucket list :laughing-rolling: and YES Woodie finally tasted some of your stuff that was quite nice :laughing-rolling:

Anyway just fruggggled Molasses in Adelaide and the local Coopers rural mob have 20 litres for $60 :handgestures-thumbupleft: so just may have to pay a visit in the morning and see if I can haggle a bit for a few of them so I can dedicate my whisky fermenter to a rum one and get a few generations done as I do have enough whisky to drown in :laughing-rolling:

Suppose now as Rum has been off my list time to look at the forum to find the quantity of molasses needed for a 60 litre ferment :think: then more than likely just do it my way :laughing-rolling: :laughing-rolling:

Cheers Bryan

[TheRealMrMessy]

Suppose now as Rum has been off my list time to look at the forum to find the quantity of molasses needed for a 60 litre ferment :think: then more than likely just do it my way :laughing-rolling: :laughing-rolling:

Arrrghhh me hearty! You want 6L of molasses and 6kg raw sugar in a 60L ferment. I used 10L of dunder for the first two generations then drop to 5L from there so pH isn't a problem! 20L for 60 bucks is pretty damn cheap - what type, blackstrap? I had issues fermenting out anytime I tried a straight molasses version, but it might be more successful for the first 1-2 generations than later ones.
:obscene-drinkingchug:

Looking forward to the spiced rum - should filter on Monday and have a sample vs the SS dark spiced (in both rum and in FFV). That said, might give everything one more week to mellow and breathe.

[TheRealMrMessy]

Giving it a bit more time to mellow out, left is unspiced while by the powers of deduction, it means the right one is spiced...

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[TheRealMrMessy]

Got distracted, have finally had another go of the mixes today. They've had plenty of time to mellow and settle out now!

Strong and unbalanced spices would be my immediate comment. I ended up cutting the spiced rum down to 1/4 with the unspiced stuff and its a nice subtle flavour now. Half would be more familiar to a stronger spiced rum. It's not bad though I'm not sure which flavour is a bit OTT in the mix. I am thinking next is to quick age a few more litres of the rum and spice up say, 100ml with each individual spice. Start blending "tincures" of them to find the right balance, similar to how you can experiment with gin botanicals.

I ended up tossing the Still Spirits Dark Spiced Rum that was blended into a rather pleasant neutral down the drain. Mirrors most rum/bourbon essence experiences in that they haven't been horrible, just... no character and quite bland. The one I mixed into some actual aged rum was much better - I'll never waste aged rum on this ever again, but I at least kept it and will drink it at some point. The 1/4 strength spiced rum is much more palatable and interesting.

Kraken or a reasonable approximation they are definitely not, and remain far from. It'll take a while until I get around to making up individual spice test samples but I'll get the process started before EOY.