Today we have another Caroni Rum review. Following the 1998 19 Year Old reviewed yesterday, now we have a 1998 20 Year Old Caroni Rum bottled by The Duchess (which I reviewed their Belize rum a few weeks ago and loved it). Like the 19 Year Old, it was mostly aged on the continent and not at the Caribbeans. This is cask #19 that yielded 288 bottles.

Yesterday we had cask #6 and today it’s #19 so I’m wondering if it’s the same distillate batch or an altogether different distillate. There’s one major difference between those casks and it’s the strength. This 20 Year Old was bottled at a very high strength of 64.6%. Can we brave it neat?

Caroni Rum 20 Year Old (1998-2018) The Duchess (64.6%, €195,00)

Nose: Sweet brown sugar, quite hard to nose with that ABV but after letting it rest in the glass for a few minutes there’s also toasted wood, plastical sweetness. Have to add some water and then it’s magical: there’s finally complexity and depth (not on Mariana Trench level tho), far less plastic relaxed sweetness, lots of brown and demerara sugar, crushed blueberry and cranberries, perfumey edge.

Palate: Sweet, tar, oily, wet sandy beach, a bit of plastic, a touch of black olives, pepper, oak spices. With water: relaxed, more fruit and berries, sugar sweetness, tar, oils and engine metal parts, black olives.

Finish: Medium long length, lingering sweet sugar and red fruit paste.

Thoughts: That’s a great Caroni once you add a few drops of water. It’s too though neat but with water it’s far more balanced and showing out all great fruitiness and subtle Caroni characteristics. Great stuff Nils!