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Aged Rum, stirred

Rum Old Fashioned

Barline 2,1b,2,1,Ro

The code is the shorthand off my printed menu; the Key tab decodes every letter.

Stir with ice until cold, then strain.

Rocks, iced, orange twist.

Open in the menu

Taste

Two ounces of aged rum, one barspoon of demerara, nothing more for sugar. The molasses of the syrup and the barrel of the rum are the same family, so the drink reads as rum first, then spice. Two dashes of Angostura and one of orange bitters keep clove and peel in the glass. Rocks, ice, and an orange twist: it sits.

History

The Old-Fashioned takes its name from drinkers in the 1870s who asked for an old-fashioned whiskey cocktail after bartenders began dressing the Whiskey Cocktail with absinthe, curacao, and other liqueurs. The formula itself is older: spirit, sugar, water, and bitters, the definition printed in The Balance and Columbian Repository in 1806. A rum Old-Fashioned is that template with the whiskey swapped out, a substitution that became common in craft bars in the 2000s as aged rum was treated as a sipping spirit. This menu pours two ounces of aged rum, one barspoon of demerara syrup, two dashes of Angostura, and one of orange bitters, over ice with an orange twist.

Same shape, other bottles

The Old-Fashioned family, with the bottle that changed.

This is one drink on my home bar's menu. Tick the bottles you own and the menu lists which of all 185 drinks they pour.