Appleton Estate Signature Blend

I picked this up on sale recently, with the new green and white label. It's got some nice funk, but still very beginner friendly. Definitely enjoyed it, and easily available and affordable. This is a good intro to Jamaican rum for many people. Mixes well also!

Decent rum, every man's friend but nothing special either.

There wasn’t one thing that stood out… it is as if they blended it into oblivion. There is nothing that stands out but some mild hogo. The aftertaste is a bit off but it works in mixed drinks. Probably better out there.

Good sipper for weekdays, i’ll take the 21 12 or 21 for the weekend

Cheap and good value for cocktails requiring jamaican rum. Funky and smooth mixed. A little rough neat but not even that bad.

With some nice complexity and spice, it is a bit too bitter for my liking. Downfall is the strong alcohol finish.

One of the few rums I can sip neat over ice nice with a lemon slice.

I drink the more sweeter rums. Came from Jamaica and had high hopes. The taste was awful. Not my kind.

Good one, best value.
Říkám in its origin. I've just taste first sip and pretty like it.

First, the good news, this is a great all around mixing rum with few competitors at its price point. No, it is definitely not a "sipper", but the price point should be a pretty decent clue. This is a basic, no frills Jamaican rum. It has minimal complexity but is not entirely just one note either. The nose is pretty simple, caramel, a touch of vanilla and orange. The flavor is similar but adds some touches of warmth, dried fruits and the classic Jamaican "funk". The really great thing is the price, for the price it makes a great foundation for a Grog, a Daquiri a Mai Tai or any other number of great cocktails.

My only real complaint against this rum is that when I started drinking rum, and started drinking Appleton's products specifically, their basic rum was the VX, which, for anybody who tasted it 10-15 years ago knows, was a pretty big step up from this offering. To add to the situation, when they first made the switch from VX to this Signature blend it seemed to be essentially the same product, for quite a while actually. Then, one day they changed the flavor, and definitely for the worse. It is still a good rum, and a good value, but in the VX iteration it was a spectacular product for the money. I still recommend this product, but us old timers really miss the previous version.