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!
Nose: Sweet wood and raisins, almost sherry like. Then there’s that Caroni dirtiness, tar, diesel oil fumes, salted fishes, black olives, brown sugar, toasted oak and sweet burnt plastic. 
Nose: Mellow nose but it does have a heavy dpose of earthy peat smoke at first, fruity with lemon, grapefruit, pineapple, green papaya and a bit of honey, sprinkled with a pinch of salt, After a few minutes less peat smoke and stronger fruitiness. 
Nose: Crisp and well defined, sweet vanilla, sweet peat, It’s sweet but it’s not cloying or a dominating sweetness. Instead it’s more like gentle cake sugar icing sweetness. No smoke so far, but it does gets fruity after a few minutes: apricots with hints of floral perfume . With a few drops of water it’s on a new level of fruitiness with more apricots, green mango and papaya and becomes more perfumey. 
Nose: Sour vanilla, lactic, wine tannins, cream, toffee and caramel. After a few minutes in the glass it becomes more winey and with cream, butterscotch and cinnamon. Very gentle and polished nose. 
Nose: Malt, red wine sweetness, vanilla, gentle tannins and white pepper, red berries led by raspberries and gooseberries. After a while butterscotch, nutmeg and a bit of cinnamon. 
Nose: Comparing to the 10yo, here we have more intense and deeper fruit sweetness along with stronger, almost sour, vanilla notes. Subtle smoke, peaches and apricots followed by citrus fruitiness. After a few minutes, more smoke and lactic vanilla in the background. 
Nose: Sweet fruit, peaches and nectarines, wafts of gentle smoke, creamy nuttiness. After a few minutes, vanilla, dried strawberries, lactic and toffee. 
Whisky Gospel 