Sunday 14 August 2016

Review 86 - Rum Nation Jamaica 1991 25 year old Supreme Lord VIII

Photo copyright © H.Kristoffersen
Sorry for the bad crop. But the rum is awesome!


Information
Personally, I’ve been waiting a long time for this to pop up.

First of all, I’m a fanboy of the Rum Nation bottlings, so a new Supreme Lord will always be extremely interesting. Especially since this will probably be the last Supreme Lord bottling according to Mr. Rossi, as this is the last batch of old Jamaican rums he has in store.

Secondly, this particular one is a 25 year old Jamaican from the Monymusk distillery, which I haven’t had much experience with yet. And that makes it even more interesting.

The rum is made in the classic Jamaican style with lots of dunder and refined to perfection on a traditional pot still.

The batch resulted in 4 barrels of nectar, which was aged for 13 years in old american oak barrels previously used for Scottish whisky, before being transferred to old Oloroso sherry casks for an additional 12 years of maturation.

After the 25 years, Mr. Rossi bottled 750 bottles at cask strength 55,7% ABV without any kind of tampering.

According to Rum Nation themselves, ”… the biggest, juiciest and boldest aged Jamaican rum we have ever released”.

Way to raise some seriously high expectations.

Presentation
It sports the newish, huge cardboard box, which I kind of hate. It takes up way to much space on my shelf, it feels a bit tacky and the old wooden boxes just fits these luxury rums better. And suddenly I'm the old guy crying about how everything was better in the old days again.

The bottle is the classic, tall bar room bottle, which Rum Nation previously used for all their rums, but lately only brought into play with their top of the line products.

The colour scheme is particularly nice with its brown, gold and beige tones, which fit the copper coloured rum perfectly.

Labelwise there is nothing new to highlight. Typical Rum Nation stuff, although they did take their time to write quite the background story on the back label this time.

Nothing too crazy or unbelievable, but mostly facts and a couple of well placed superlatives.

In the glass it shows massive curtains and the copper colour is just beautiful.

Nose
There is no denying the heritage.

It leads off with massive Jamaican funk. Green apples and black, overripe bananas, along with some thick blackcurrant jams and a dash of stale cola.

Along with the agressive fruit funk, there is an equally agressive winey edge on it, wielding lots of tannins. They don’t pierce your nose and take a stab at your brain, like tannins can do. They are more well rounded, but still very present.

Super delicious nose, although not that surprising. I’m just barely excited about it, but it doesn’t stray too far from the typical Jamaican path, which takes a couple of points off the excitement.

Taste
Oh my … Wauw … This is just … Wauw!

First impressions are good. Great even.

Super fruity without going off a cliff with it. It doesn’t funk off like many other Jamaicans. It feels older, more mature, more controlled.

Ripe black grapes, blackcurrants and green apples create a perfectly balanced trinity on top of a thin wafer of yesterdays cola.

Super dry with a decent amount of tannins. Just enough to create an awesome drying effect, and luckily not enough to destroy your mouth.

At the very end, there is a slight sensation of burning tires in the distance, but just enough to add another facet to this gem.

It is so tasty, so balanced and so great, that I just want to keep drinking it. With a couple of good friends. In a quiet atmosphere.

Just wauw.

Finish
You don’t really want it to go away. You’ll be begging it to stay, actually.

And it will. It stays with you for a long, long time and keeps delivering a lot of great flavours.

When it finally starts to fade, savoury, burning tires keeps lingering, among the now well known fruity funk.

A great swirl of memories from a time just seconds or minutes ago. 

Marvelous.

Rating and final thoughts
Ok. I’m officially blown away. This is the single best Rum Nation rum I’ve had so far.

The level of funk, the balanced flavours, the long finish, the over all composition, everything just works. 

The nose didn’t bring anything new to the table, but does it really have to?
I’m not really sure. But the lack of surprise or innovation is what prevents it from getting the actually "gold medal".

The decision to amp it up to cask strength for the first time outside of white rums and Caronis, was a very, very good one. The high strength really seems to take it to the next level, and luckily the rum is good enough to manage it.

Rums of this caliber doesn’t come cheap. I bet you knew that already.
And this one isn’t any different, as it goes for around €250 anywhere I’ve seen it.


Because of that price tag it enters a category of rums where most people have to prioritise quite a lot before they buy. The average rum geek doesn’t just throw around €250 for a bottle of rum that often.

But you should consider doing it for a bottle like this. There is a boatload of other rums in your financial neighbourhood, when you dabble in rums this expensive, so I’m not saying that this is the only one worth buying or even the best one available.

If you love Jamaicans and like you rums strong, then you should definitely get it.

If you do not absolutely, head over heels, love Jamaicans, you should probably choose something else. There is a lot of other very great rums, from very great bottlers out there, which also deserve attention and recognition.

If you think it is a bit out of your financial reach, let it go. There isn’t a bottle of rum out there, which justifies making enemies with your banker.

I really wish I could write a lot more smart and pretty words about it, but it’s not really necessary.

Long story short: It’s great. It’s expensive. It’s superb. It’s one to keep for future savouring.

It doesn’t really have any flaws, and it is among the most tasty rums I’ve ever had. And certainly the best Rum Nation one. So I have to bring out the big guns to salute it.

Therefore a…

Rating: 88/100

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