Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Food & Drink
  3. News

Belizean rum is where it’s at and these cocktails prove it

A couple of classics, with rum front and center

Copalli Rum trio.
Copalli Rum

We’re living in the rum renaissance. The spirit is no longer just a quiet backseat mixer, it’s a star in its own right, playing a major role in classic cocktail recipes across the board. Perhaps best, it’s wildly place-specific, showcasing the flavors of the very place its raised, whether that’s Belize, Hawaii, the West Indies, or somewhere else.

Turns out, you can swap that bourbon or gin for rum in a lot of cases within the wide world of cocktails. You just need the right rum, like Copalli. The Belizean maker features white and aged rums, as well as a decidedly delicious and unique cacao rum. Whiel you can sip these offerings on their own, we suggest them in the following mixed sippers.

Recommended Videos

Old Fashioned

Old Fashioned cocktail
Pylyp Sukhenko / Unsplash

An Old Fashioned recipe with rum? Of course, it’s 2025 after all. Wake up and start reimagining the traditions. You’ll love the smoothness of this balanced drink.

Ingredients:

  • 1 ounce Copalli Cacao Rum
  • 1 ounce Copalli Barrel Rested Rum
  • 1 ounce vanilla syrup
  • 4 dashes orange bitters
  • 4 dashes aromatic bitters

Method:

  1. Build in a mixing glass add ice, stir until chilled and strain into a rocks glass over a big cube of ice.
  2. Garnish with dehydrated, orange peel, or other citrus.

Espresso Martini

Person holding an espresso martini glass placing coffee beans as a garnish.
Kike Salazar N / Unsplash

Frankly, we’re a little tired of Espresso Martini recipes, at least the standard ones. That’s why we’ve sought out this rum-soaked option, soon to be your favorite.

Ingredients:

  • 2 ounces Copalli Cacao Rum
  • 2 ounces espresso
  • 1 ounce vanilla syrup

Method:

  1. Combine all ingredients in shaker.
  2. Shake and strain in martini glass.

If you still have rum on the mind, we don’t blame you. Check out our feature on great Hawaiian rum, of which there is quite a bit thanks to some meticulous producers in the Rainbow state these days.

Mark Stock is a writer from Portland, Oregon. He fell into wine during the Recession and has been fixated on the stuff since… Read Full Bio
Breckenridge just bottled a Colorado peach orchard into their new whiskey
Food, Fruit, Liquor, Whiskey

Colorado-based Breckenridge Distillery has just released their Peach Whiskey, the second flavored expression this year following the recent launch of its Honey Whiskey over the summer.

The whiskey is made using real peaches from Palisade, the Western Slope town Colorado treats as its unofficial peach capital and a genuine point of state pride during late summer harvest season.

Read more
Hard Truth’s new whiskey is built out of its two best ryes
Alcohol, Beverage, Liquor

Nashville, Indiana-based Hard Truth Distilling is taking two of its most decorated ryes and smashing them together into one bottle.

The new Master Distiller’s Reserve Dark Roast Rye is a 50/50 blend of the distillery’s Chocolate Malt Rye and Caramel Malt Rye, two mash bills that have individually racked up gold medals at the San Francisco World Spirits Competition since Hard Truth started experimenting with roasted malts back in 2018.

Read more
Build an award-winning bar cart with these 12 top spirits
Alcohol, Beverage, Liquor

For me, a solid liquor cabinet holds the absolute basics— vodka, whiskey, gin, tequila, bitters, and a few home bar essentials for crafting cocktails. But my less-than-impressive shelf had a fundamental flaw—I focused on variety instead of craftsmanship, barely looking beyond the label. So I amassed a dozen award-winning spirits to see if I could taste the difference. 

The results? I learned that much of what I blamed on my technique was actually due to my spirits’ quality. With better bottles in hand, straight pours brought on deeper complexity, and cocktails achieved effortless balance, without a single skill set shift.

Read more