The first is Wagemut XO Barbados Rum 43.8%.
This is a relatively old rum. It carries a handsome 18 years and has matured in American white oak casks, most likely ex-bourbon. It was given a final 3-month finish in first-fill original PX sherry casks.
Colour:
Medium golden amber.
Nose:
There are fairly clear classic Foursquare notes of vanilla and coconut, plus cantaloupe melon, rock sugar and a little mild spice from the cask. The nose is not heavy, but soft and pleasant.
Palate:
You can sense the Foursquare distillate underneath a mild but present PX influence. The rum is mild, soft and easy to drink. Blue plum and raisin. A very neatly groomed rum. Foursquare is generally very well made, and this one has been softened with PX cask influence.
Foursquare is remarkably well made across the board. There is not a finger to be laid on it. I have tasted Foursquare with a PX finish before: an 8-year-old that, when I tasted it straight from the cask, had spent six months in PX. It was outstanding. But that was at cask strength, around 62-63%. This rum sits at 43.8%, and I do not think the strength quite balances the sweetness. For my own palate it tips slightly too sweet and too soft. But I know plenty of people love that style of rum, so it certainly has the potential to become a go-to bottle for a lot of drinkers.
The next and last rum this time round is Wagemut PX Cask Barbados 40.3%.
The rum is built from components matured between 5 and 12 years in casks that previously held PX sherry, and the question is how much of that PX sherry actually got poured out of the barrel, because there is a good deal of PX character in this rum.
Colour:
Pale hazelnut.
Nose:
Right at the start there are clear notes of raisin and a little sulphur from the PX cask, which fades quickly and disappears entirely. After that come vanilla, coconut, pineapple juice, raisin and dried apricot.
Palate:
It comes across as quite sweet and rather one-dimensional. The same flavour all the way through. That usually means the sugar content is relatively high. It may be down to a fair amount of PX sherry being mixed into the rum, and the question is whether it has been let down with PX sherry. If you like sweet, soft rum and sweet sherry, this is an obvious choice. Personally I think it is a shame to sweeten a quality rum from Foursquare to this extent.
I said that was the last rum this time round. There is one more, though. It is not a rum, but it is made from rum. A rum liqueur: Wagemut Ida Van Der Lille rum liqueur 33.2%. We are well beyond the boundaries of what can be called rum here. With liqueur there is normally at least 100 grams of sugar per litre, and I would judge there is at least that here. So if you have a sweet tooth, you will not go short.
The producer writes on their website: "The finest rum with no added extract or aroma - only real vanilla pods. It is that simple."
Colour:
Pale straw.
Nose:
It actually smells far more of rum than you would expect. Bergamot, cardamom and sweet dried fruit.
Palate:
I am simply not convinced no sugar has been added. It is VERY sweet, and that cannot come from vanilla pods alone. The viscosity is thick and oily. The vanilla is less dominant than you would expect, but there is plenty of orange. It gives me references to A.H. Riise and triple sec. Plenty of sweetness. Plenty of orange. Orange and bergamot with a little acidity and bitterness. Candied violets are in there too.
Cheers, and enjoy the Wagemut.
