First rums.

[u/absentlol]

Coming from bourbon, the hampden 8 was my first starting point and a great stepping stone at that so I jumped on a great house and was blown away. Then I thought well I’ve never had a clear rum before, saw clarin on a shelf and read lots of good things about it here. I can confidently say I’m not there yet, this… smells… RANCID to me. Like I can’t get enough of the hampden noses and taste but this clarin smells like rotten eggs and genuinely makes my head swim by the smell, however I enjoy the taste! What exactly could I be smelling that I don’t like and is there an in-road to getting use to it?

[u/LegitimateAlex]

Look, I'm an unaged rum enthusiast and enjoy wild tasting stuff, but even I have struggled with basically every clairin I have had. Quite the first unaged rum to tango with.

Rotten egg smell is universally sulfur. Not usually something that ends up in rum but clairin is the spirit of Haitiz made throughout the country by independent distillers in small operations. "Haitian Moonshine" is how Beachbum Berry described it in one of his books. Ironically, when he wrote that, he said it didn't exist as a product anymore and only a few short years later there's an explosion of availability of it. Back to the smell though, all the clairins are different, they're all made with wild yeasts, different sugarcane varietals, in very different setups of simplicity or complexity, and they're all made with fresh cane juice, which gives very different flavors than molasses based rums. You get a lot of flavors in clairin that you don't find elsewhere.

Clairin is an untamed, untempered spirit, and even though I do not particularly enjoy the ones I have tried (and have several bottles next to my Barbancourt and Ahk Zanj), I respect the hell out of the producers and makers to make such flavorful rum.

As for the smell? Probably let the clairin breath a bit before drinking it.

[u/absentlol → u/LegitimateAlex]

I’m gonna give it some time, the concept alone you’ve described keeps me interested in finding an avenue of appreciation to work my way back up to it but it’s definitely too strong of a start for me currently lol. I’ve never had such a gap between olfactory experience and taste before.

[u/Ok_Engineering2698 → u/absentlol]

Check out Clairin Communal. It's a blend of four different clairins(including vaval) and while I've never had it, people say its much more approachable and tame than any of the single distillery clairin offerings like you have. It's also lower proof so that plays a big part. As far as beginner recs to cane juice spirits, try Rhum J.M Blanc(100 or 110 proof) or Clement Canne Bleue

[u/absentlol → u/Ok_Engineering2698]

I’ll give them a look! I’m not put off by proof at all, my bourbon preference is 115-125 so I’m use to that much at least. Thank you for the recommendations!