Day 16 of my fascinating rum advent calendar. This one's Martiniquan, from Martinique. Not the first rum location I've never heard of. I'm sure there's a lot to learn here, so let's get to it.
Bit of an intro
Did you know there was a place called Martinique? I didn't. It turns out it's an island in the Lesser Antilles of the West Indies. It's French, so we can probably expect a French style rum which would be light, fruity and maybe floral. The island had a reputation for great soil for growing sugar cane long before rum was produced there. The sugar cane industry there collapsed when sugar beet, and cheap South American sugar were introduced tot he market and since the islands economy relied so heavily on the sugar cane cash crop the while islands economy was a mess. They mayor of a town called Le Francois, Homere Clement, bought a sugar plantation at that time for what was presumably a pretty reasonable price, and invested in some rum making equipment and began to produce agricole rum from the juice of the sugar cane grown on the plantation. Smart move as the plantation workers were able to return to work.
This particular rum doesn't have any kind of age statement, and the website doesn't give any more clues. They do produce other rums using with VSOP, XO and 10 year statements, but with this one they only say that it's aged in barrels. They say some fancy things about the barrels, saying they're "particular" and chosen for their "rich natural sweetness" and "intense aromatic qualities". This doesn't tell us a great deal. They provide tasting notes, but the only concrete flavour they mention is vanilla. I'm assuming the barrels they use are American oak because of the vanilla note.
Clement Select Barrel is bottled at 40% ABV so I'm not expecting a particularly complex spirit, especially since the only flavour mentioned in the producer's tasting notes is vanilla. I'm thinking this is a relatively young rum too, since it hasn't made it onto their list of aged rums. They mention a smooth finish too, which often means sweet. Overall I'm expecting a light, sweet rum with a the fiery character of a young spirit. We'll see how that goes and I'll comment on it in the extra comments when I'm done tasting. I can't find information about colouring or chill-filtration. It doesn't look like much colouring is used if any, but no clues yet about filtering.
Packaging
Nice. Looks pretty up market and a bit old style. Have a butcher's.
Fancy
I like the colour scheme. Dark blue and kind of goldy colour work well. It's relatively simple with a picture of what I looks like some kind of mansion. Maybe the main building of the distillery, or the house of the plantation owner or something. It gives more information that some of the samples too, saying it's an agricole rum and giving a vague description. It only say's it's smooth and that the sweetness is balanced, which is more of a marketing thing than a description, but at least it's a comment on the taste. They've managed to do it with writing big enough to read too, even though it's just a miniaturized version of the full size bottle label. Well done, label designer.
Smell in the bottle
On opening
Superglue.
Vanilla.
Bit of spice, maybe cinnamon and clove.
Appearance
Kind of yellowy browny. Fairly standard barrel aged spirit colour. Observe:
Dark yellowish
No surprises on the colour. It's about the same as a lot of the others. I couldn't find out if there was any artificial colouring used, but judging by the appearance I'd say there is either none, or very little. It's possible that they use just a touch to get a consistent colour across batches.
Neat
Nose
Surprisingly whisky-ish.
Vanilla.
Spiced apple, apple and cinnamon it seems.
Kind of a spicy floral note.
Maybe a touch of jasmine, but I'm really not sure on that.
Oak.
Touch earthy.
Barley sugar sweets.
Arrival
Sweet.
Bit of woody spice.
Slightly floral.
Development
Oaky.
A little citrus.
Woody spice.
Finish
Oaky.
Dry tanniny, slightly bitter note.
Vanilla.
Kind of dark chocolate, but more spice-like complexity.
Water - just a little
Nose
Soft, powdery feel, almost perfumey.
Grassy leafy.
Woody vanilla.
Hint of tobacco I think.
Bit of something fruity. Kind of sweet/sour.
Arrival
Sweet and oaky.
Dark chocolate.
Vanilla.
Faint smokiness.
Development
Hint of tobacco.
Warming spices. Maybe cinnamon, but more warmth than flavour.
Maybe lemon rind.
very faint smokiness.
Finish
Warm spices.
Oak.
Woody vanilla.
Hint of tobacco.
Dark chocolate.
Maybe grape?
Drying, tanniny quality.
Hint of fragrant savoury herbs.
Hint of pineapple.
A few extra comments
I said I'd comment on my expectations of this rum's youth in the extra comments so here it is. There is a bit of a of a lively, fieriness to it, which would usually give away a relatively short amount of time in the barrel. Time in the barrel mellows a spirit out in that department. If this was a whisky I'd definitely say it was fairly young, but with a rum aged in a hotter climate I'd suggest it's very young. In hotter climates the maturation occurs quicker, but not in the same way. I suspect that the cask imparts its flavours to the spirit more rapidly, but the spirit doesn't calm down in the same way as a properly matured scotch. It seems to have plenty of cask influence on the flavour, and I don't think more would help things, however it doesn't have the mellow feel of an old spirit. I hope that made sense, it's getting late and I'm getting sleepy.
Conclusion
Interesting spirit with plenty of complexity for a 40% ABV spirit. No too sweet and it delivered something to every level of taste and smell, by which I mean there were light aromatic bits experienced up in the nasal passages down to deep dark chocolate notes experienced low down in the mouth and a bunch of things in between, On a scale of one to ten I was pleasantly surprised by the complexity. Well balanced, and a lot more going on than just the vanilla they mention on the website. It was also interesting to consider the age when they didn't give me much of a clue about it. Would I buy a bottle? Unlikely because it's not available here, but I'd definitely consider a glass if I saw it in a bar. On the whole it's a decent rum and the price I've seen for it seems about right.
Come back tomorrow for another review of whatever it is tomorrow. Rum of some sort. Maybe it's from Madagascar, we just don't know at this stage.
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