Gosling's Black Seal

Weird, kind of sweet, kind of bitter, salty without the taste of salt. Won't ever buy it again but glad I've experienced it.

Decent dark rum, but of spice so perfect for a dark n stormy.

Drinking a glass of this neat was an experience, but not one I will repeat. It has all the subtlety of a wrecking ball. Pure petrol on the nose and equally unpleasant on the palate with an almost medicinal flavour and viscosity. I can imagine it was a big hit with thirsty pirates back in the day ...

I purchased the Gosling's on an impulse after reading about their rather famous patented Dark & Stormy cocktail. The ingredients appealed to me--Lime is my favorite citrus juice and ginger beer is one of my favorite fizzy mixers. The trademarked cocktail includes 2oz of the 80 proof rum and there's no burn at all, the lime and ginger beer effectively mask the taste of the black rum, which (to me) is mostly a good thing...taken neat it's kinda like straight molasses and not so good, though I wouldn't call it ghastly. Like Pusser's, it's not what I'm accustomed to in "good" aged rums, though it's interesting. One thing bugs me, though it has nothing to do with the rum itself...in photos the bottle design is attractive, but they've now switched to a wrap-around plastic label with a multi-colored Caribbean carnival theme, it's simply ugly. I guess their marketing team wants to appeal to young party-freak customers, which might be the most appropriate niche for this stuff, but they should fire their graphic designer. Gosling's is cheap and you might give it a try if the Dark & Stormy sounds appealing to you...or perhaps for you, Gosling's will stand on its own merits.

Tried it blind. I'm no taste expert but ya. I immediately noted it as something cheap and designer. Tastes of something like burnt green grass and a little rubbery. I get some raisin too but it's all buried under what I assume is tons of adjunct flavorings. This stuff is a mess and is honestly bottom tier rum.

No other option for a Dark 'n' Stormy, and not just for legal reasons. I'm annoyed at Gosling's for sweetening their ginger beer with HFCS and for that reason Bundaberg is my first choice. BTW, this is also great in a classic Painkiller.

I tried only Sailor Jerry so this one was much more flavorful. I loved it. Smoother than the saylor.
Also better for cakes in comparison of the sailor, as it gives much more and more complex flavor (which was the main reason i bought the spiced rum in the first place)

Not worth the price. Seems people have rated this higher purely based on the dark and stormy drink but the rum itself honestly is lacking.

I'll be honest; I didn't check any RumRatings reviews before buying this but instead picked it up in honour of my pal Mike who lives in Bermuda and reckons he's got through dozens of bottles of it. Well, I think Mike's perspective may be a bit skewed because I was kinda disappointed. I found the Gosling's Black Seal had very little of the kinda flavour I expect from rum, but with a very mild sweetness and plenty of spice. It's a nice dark colour, but sadly that's no indication of what's to come. It completely disappears in Coke; I honestly couldn't taste it at all but I dunno, maybe that's a good feature for when you're making a cocktail. I also noticed that the neat product became more 'chemical' (couldn't think of a better descriptor) toward the end of the bottle and I'm not sure why that should happen. I will say that a small blob of molasses really helped this rum but, there again, why should I have to add anything? 4/10, probably wouldn't buy it again but I'll happily agree with all the reviewers who've said it makes a great cocktail.

there is no dark n stormy without this black seal ...