Rum Nation Port Mourant Small Batch Rare Rums 2001

Rum Nation bottled this single batch from the Port Mourant estate, the double wooden pot still made of greenheart that no modern column can imitate and the heaviest, most polarising voice in Guyanese rum. At eighteen years and 57.6 percent it sits in Rum Nation's drier Rare Rums tier, a long way from the softer Spanish style bottlings the house is also known for, and it wears the classic continental Demerara cut with no hidden sweetness to round it off.

The molasses spirit came off the pot still oily and pungent, then took on a port cask layer that nudges the dark fruit toward prune and dried cherry. Expect the unmistakable Port Mourant signature of licorice and anise wrapped in sawn timber, leather and a faint thread of smoke, with a warm herbal bitterness running through the finish. This is a sipper for drinkers already comfortable with raw, woody Demerara at strength, best given air and a few drops of water rather than rushed.