Le Gus‘t Engenhos do Norte Madeira Rum 2010

Le Gus't is an independent bottler, and this 2010 draws on Engenhos do Norte of Madeira, one of the few places outside the French islands entitled to the term rhum agricole. It is a single cask made from fresh-pressed sugarcane juice rather than molasses, aged eleven years and bottled at full strength.

Matured in a Madeira cask, the wine influence runs deep: a sweet nose of grapes, port and spice, a dry, woody, spicy, grassy palate with a distinct bitterness, and a finish of wood, earth, spice and yellow fruit. The combination of cane-juice base and fortified-wine cask gives an unusual, almost Calvados-like flavour profile. There is no added sugar. At 53.3% it pushes the dry, tannic, wine-cask levers hard, so this is a rum for intensity rather than comfort, best sipped neat by drinkers who enjoy bold, wine-influenced spirits.