So far:

Waggon & Horses

Most shots £2.20

1) Mount Gay Eclipse

amber. slight medicinal nose. light “nyquil” scent. star anise (or similar) rather strong. pleasant but do not buy.

2) Sailor Jerry

pale tea colour. slight candy nose. light taste to start, builds on tongue to (?) demerara sugar. slightly sweet like creme brulee topping. i like the nose, taste a bit too light.

3) Havana Club – Anejo 3 Anos / 3yo

pale straw. nose more delicate than SJ. fresh “pink flavour”[1] smell. reminiscent of light malts but with a pure sugar taste. would buy/stock, but probably not drink too often.

4) Havana Club – Anejo Especial

heavier than the 3yo, more complex. pale tea colour. medium flavour, medium sweet. cf some speysides? probably best sipped over ice. no ‘throat burn’ but approaching it. might buy.

5) Cockspur

medium straw colour, nose between nos. 2) and 3). closer to SJ. Medium taste, builds over time but not to quite the sweetness of SJ. would stock.

Also on optic:

1. Captain Morgan
2. Morgan Spiced
3. Woods 100

Did not try – 5 shots is more than sufficient for an evening, even atop a heavy meal of gammon w/ mushroom rice.

Cricketers

1. Captain Morgan
2. Morgan Spiced
3. Bacardi
4. Bacardi Gold

Bacardi Gold at £3.30 a shot. Ouch. Did not try.

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[1] “pink flavour” is a theory of mine that goes back to the mid 1980s; from childhood I always swore that there were six flavours, not four; in addition to sweet/sour/salt/bitter there were “brown flavour” and “pink flavour”, brown flavour being why you pick at the gunk scraped out of a bacon frying-pan or roasting dish, and pink flavour being the artificial high scent/flavour that you get from pink inflatable school puddings, really fresh mangos, or (this sounds stupid, but…) from sniffing petrol car exhaust turned-over from cold (not diesel).

It turned out I was bang on the money with brown flavour (now: “Umami“); and although I am not quite sure whether pink flavour is a proper taste or just a scent, I live in hope of complete vindication.

Plus it makes for a good pub rant about school puddings.