CDI Savanna 2004

CDI Savanna 2004 is an eighteen year old cane-juice rum from Savanna on Reunion, bottled by Compagnie des Indes, the respected, terroir-led French house known for its single casks. Savanna is unusual in making agricole, molasses and high-ester Grand Arome rums side by side, and this aged cane-juice expression is bottled as a single cask at cask strength with no added sugar.

Distilled on a column still and matured in ex-bourbon oak, with long tropical ageing behind it, the rum has developed a mature, leathery depth. The nose carries oak, raisin and apricot with a clear ester lift, while the palate turns peppery and tannic with tropical fruit and leather, closing woody, minty and faintly bitter. At 54.1% it is full but balanced, the kind of older Reunion cane-juice rum that rewards slow sipping. One for experienced palates who like their agricole dry, woody and built on tobacco and dried-fruit character.