Rum, and more rum


November 9, 2025

A word of caution
Let me please remind you that my humble assessments of any spirits are done from the point of view of a malt whisky enthusiast who, what's more, is aboslutely not an expert in rum, brandy, tequila, vodka, gin or any other spirits. Thank you – and peace!

Rum, and
more rum

And we’re certainly not going to complain, especially as we’re kicking off this new little session with a small-batch independent Foursquare at a very approachable strength…All the while with thoughts fixed on Jamaica, which is currently striving to mend its wounds.

Foursquare 8 yo (41%, Tres Hombres, Barbados, 4,296 bottles, 2023)

A maturation of eight years on location, followed by five months at sea aboard a sailing vessel in former calvados and PX casks. Just a reminder that the house of Tres Hombres has nothing to do with the famous eponymous ZZ Top album, which featured the legendary La Grange (a-haw haw haw-haw). Colour: pale gold. Nose: tremendously fresh, with honey and oranges, followed by a few delicately spiced biscuits, especially with cinnamon and star anise, plus hints of praline. Mouth: absolutely excellent, not particularly marked by the calvados or the PX, and unless I'm imagining things, there are undeniable salty and maritime notes, and even a touch of diesel. One gets the impression there's a good deal of pot still in this lively and crisp little Foursquare. Finish: not even short and still fairly saline. Comments: what's more, it's always a pleasure to enjoy a fine rum without needing to resort to our pipette and our Vittel. Then again, that does depend on the spirit's body type; here, it's a full textured one.
SGP:552 - 87 points.

Seeing as we’re hanging out with ZZ Top (well, almost…)

Oliver & Oliver 15 yo (48.5%, Tres Hombres, Dominican Republic, 2025)

15 years in bourbon casks (though within a ‘solera’ system involving a rather baffling triple-aging process – ha, the DomRep!) then 4 months at sea in PX. Since the juice hails from Oliver & Oliver, let us simply hope this isn’t too sugary… Colour: gold. Nose: very light, with notes of hay and herbal tea, just a whisper of paraffin and rubber. It isn’t particularly expressive despite some maple syrup emerging a little later; even the PX seems to be hiding, but the palate will be the final arbiter. Mouth: a little sweet but with great restraint, really nothing bothersome, with an oily texture, candlewax, some orange cake, followed by chamomile infusion and a caramel that’s present yet discreet. Finish: rather short but clean, on slightly bitter caramel and herbal tea. A touch of orange zest in the aftertaste. Comments: well, it’s pleasant! Even if not quite my style, I’ll happily admit that.
SGP:551 - 80 points.

Maybe we should’ve had the Dominican before the Foursquare, agreed. Let’s carry on…

Panama 14 yo 2010/2024 (50%, Arturo Makasare by C’Rhum, Cask Collection)

Colour: gold. Nose: same general territory as the Dominican, a light distillate handled with respect, seemingly without any makeup or Botox. A touch of fresh putty, lime blossom infusion, and a little hay once again… With water: ashes and even a faint whiff of firwood smoke, though there’s still more of that fresh putty. Mouth (neat): there is a bit of syrup, perhaps added at birth, but it lends a pleasant orgeat and triple-sec character, and everything feels freshly done with care. A drop of pineapple liqueur. With water: not much change, though it becomes a touch drier. Hints of coconut. Finish: nice length. Comments: once again, not quite my preferred style (spoken as a malt enthusiast!) but within this style, it’s really not bad at all.
SGP:551 - 82 points.

Trelawny 2014 ‘<>H’ (56%, C’Rhum by Corman-Collins, Jamaica, +/-2025)

Trelawny means Hampden, oops, they’re arriving rather early in the session. Let me just remind you of the old saying (well, mine), ‘the only thing that can follow Hampden is more Hampden’, especially when the label declares high ester levels, as it does here – around 1,000 gr/HLPA. Right then, off we go… Colour: chardonnay. Nose: brand new Scotch tape, at least a fifty-kilometre roll of the stuff. Or thereabouts. Then seaweed and olives in perfect synchronicity. With water: like a gentle giant, powerful yet approachable. Remember the prog-rock supergroup Gentle Giant? Mouth (neat): perfect, at a perfect strength that doesn’t even call for water (though we’ll reduce it anyway – procedures, you see). With water: olives, lemon, seawater, glue, tar. Finish: same again, with plenty of ground pepper now tickling your lips. Yes, yes, we know, it’s rather the alcohol. Comments: but how good this is!
SGP:463 - 90 points.

So, we're staying with Hampden for good, right to the end of this session…

Jamaican Rum (64.9%, Swell de Spirits, On Tour #8, for Limoges Spirits Festival, Jamaica, 87 bottles)

Right then, here we’ve got some <H> 2016 blended with C<>H 2007, married together in an ex-Port Mourant cask from 2011. Does any of that make the slightest sense on paper? … But in the glass, things may be altogether different. Colour: white wine. Nose: soft and rounded like a cup of hot chocolate in Vienna at first, but the cavalry soon charges in with the expected mix of seawater, olive oil, lemon juice and fresh varnish. Mind the ABV though, let’s not scorch our nostrils… With water: it folds back onto Spanish olive oil, but what Spanish olive oil! I’d recommend the one from Clos Mogador in Priorat. Their wines too, of course. Mouth (neat): very lovely (fermented mango!) though admittedly a little hot. Quick, the necessary precautions… With water: doesn’t shift an inch, just becomes easier. Happens to me often with Hampden. Finish: long, more on petrol now, but the balance remains spot on. Those fun notes of ultra-ripe mango make a welcome return. Comments: perfect. The number of times we've used that word during Hampden tastings must be frankly embarrassing. For me, at least…
SGP:563 - 90 points.

Navy Island Jamaica (57%, Navy Island, +/-2025)

A blend of 11 Jamaican rums of varying ages, all from pot stills, so inevitably with some Hampden in the mix—after all, last time we checked, there weren’t even 11 distilleries in Jamaica. Colour: pale gold. Nose: more balanced than the pure Hampdens we've just had, a touch fruitier too (ripe banana), and far more dangerous, as it currently gives the impression it could be sipped like warm milk. With water: ripe prunes, seawater, fresh tar, petrol, guavas… Wow. Mouth (neat): an incredible rush of Williams pear, clementines, varnish, glue, sea water… It’s utterly charming, there must be some low-marques in here, and that’s a very good thing. Possibly even some white rum. With water: even more Williams pear, plus a slightly sweet note. Williams pear liqueur. Finish: rather long, very good, still marked by the pear liqueur and some guava. Comments: that slight sweetness on the palate cost it a point or two, but this really is an excellent blend, one you could safely serve to your neighbours who aren’t especially ‘rum geeks’.
SGP:652 - 86 points.

To finish, let’s move on to a mini-vertical tasting of three Hampdens from La Maison & Velier, bearing in mind we’d already sampled the fourth, and youngest, the 4-year-old.

Hampden 7 yo 2018/2025 ‘HGML’ (60%, La Maison & Velier, Magnum series #3)

1,200 bottles and 600 magnums available. With these superlative rums, the bottles are safer, you can make your way through one and live to tell the tale, which is not quite guaranteed with a magnum. Apologies for the perhaps overly Bukowskiesque aside. Indeed, WF hasn’t been banned yet, much to our own astonishment. HGML means high-ester, between 1,000 and 1,300 gr/HLPA. Hold on tight… Colour: gold. Nose: criminally glorious, fat, pure, fruity (think fruit eaux-de-vie), and brimming with essential oils, terpenes and various hydrocarbons, yet delivered with a certain poise. Almost. With water: a strikingly fermentary side emerges, quite beautiful, with plenty of acetone and even some ammonia. Mouth (neat): more brutal and, crucially, drier. Fir bud schnaps, anchovy brine, kelp, industrial glue… With water: still brutal, grippy, domineering and ultra-rustic, with an enormous amount of salt. Finish: very long and finishing on a family-sized bag of ultra-salty Dutch liquorice with not a speck of sugar in sight. Comments: for the masochists—and I must humbly admit I’m among them, under these circumstances.
SGP:473 - 91 points.

Hampden 8 yo 2017/2025 ‘<H>’ (60%, La Maison & Velier, Magnum series #3)

Again, 1,200 bottles and 600 magnums. <H> carries slightly fewer esters than HGML but, strictly between us and from a malt whisky enthusiast’s perspective, it’s pretty much six of one, half a dozen of the other. It’s a bit like the ppm numbers in Octomore, not necessarily proportional, are they. Colour: gold. Nose: well, that’s me proven wrong once more straight away, this one is a touch fruitier and less focused on varnish and brine than the 2018. You’ll tell me that’s likely the effect of an extra year in wood (S., of course it is). With water: coming closer now. Mouth (neat): not a huge difference here, though there is a slightly more prominent fruity oakiness. Ultra-ripe bananas, skins and all. With water: the glues and varnishes return with full force and there’s absolutely nothing you can do about it. Finish: long and glorious, with a bit more cedarwood at this point, some pencil shavings… Incidentally, you’ll have noticed that pencils, too, come with ‘marques’: H, B, HB, F… Comments: I genuinely can’t choose between them—I love both equally, which is to say, immensely. Okay, this one was slightly fruitier…
SGP:563 - 91 points.

Hampden 9 yo 2016/2025 ‘LROK’ (60%, La Maison & Velier, Magnum series #3)

LROK is a lighter marque, between 200 and 400 gr ester/HLPA. But let me insist, there’s even less logic or consistency in these ester gradings than in the positions of a member of the long-declining French Socialist Party. Proper museum pieces, those. As our hero Coluche once put it, give them the Sahara and six months later they’re ordering sand. Right, moving on… Colour: gold. Nose: let’s be honest, this is much fruitier (banana and honey cake) and probably more complex and, above all, more elegant than the higher ester marques, though it’s by no means lacking in esters, varnish, petrol or even tar. With water: peach purée à la Bellini appears, even some mashed strawberries. Mouth (neat): low-ester, you say? Well, indeed, it’s a touch lighter, less textured, fresher, fruitier, but we’ve basically just gone from 98-octane petrol to 95. With water: salt returns, along with pencil shavings. Finish: long, saline, well-balanced, with a character not unlike a good terroir-driven sauvignon blanc, which is, at best, five percent of the world’s sauvignon blanc output IMHO… Comments: I’ve a slight preference for the two previous ones, which were a little more spectacular, but not to the extent that this lovely little LROK deserves fewer points. Let’s say the others were 91+, this one’s 91-. Don’t worry, we’re neither Moody’s, nor Fitch, nor Standard & Poor’s.
SGP:552 - 91 points.

I’m deeply ashamed of not having managed to tell these three ‘Magnums’ apart. So, I’ll be going into exile tomorrow in a teetotal country (though a tax haven), and I’ll return once I’ve recovered. Or when I get forcibly deported. Right.

Check the index of all rums we've tasted