CDI Port Mourant 2013

Compagnie des Indes bottled this single cask of Port Mourant from the 2013 vintage, nine years old and a younger, more affordable window onto Guyana's most iconic still. Port Mourant runs off a double wooden greenheart pot still, the heaviest and most polarising configuration left in the country, all oily anise and dark fruit.

Molasses based and matured in port wood to a dry, unsweetened finish, it shows the PM mark even at this age. The nose gives peach, demerara sugar, candied fruit and liquorice, the palate turns dry and salty with peach, liquorice and anise, and a strong, buttery finish of black tea closes things out. The youth shows in some young oak, but the character is unmistakable. At 57.6 percent it is intense yet well integrated, a keenly priced everyday Port Mourant for drinkers who want the classic bitterness without the vintage price.