A fascinating rum from one of the biggest names in the industry, Havana Club.

This bottling emerged as the result of a complete accident. The American sanctions on Cuba mean that former Bourbon barrels have to take a long route round to get to the island, travelling via Midleton Distillery in Ireland. A mistake at the distillery meant that Havana Club were sent former Islay single malt Scotch whisky casks, instead of second fill Irish whiskey barrels.

Nevertheless, Havana Club decided to age some rum in these barrels, to see what would happen. The rum aged in the ex-Islay barrels forms the core of this release. Asbel Morales, the Maestro del Ron Cabano at Havana Club, married these fascinating whisky-matured rums with some of the richest Cuban spirits in their reserves, ensuring balanced blend.

During this time, Nick Blacknell, the International Marketing Director of Havana Club created a new limited range of “Professional Edition”, developed with bartenders to produce unique rums with fascinating flavour profiles. Blacknell met up with Nick Strangeway, the acclaimed London bartender, and took him to Cuba, where he helped put his own twist on this rum.

In the end, this rum contains a base of three aged rum parcels, one of which had been aged in Islay casks for 12 months. This spirit is accompanied by some extra aged “Centenario” rum, aged in white oak casks. All in all, the rum has been aged for a minimum of seven years.

The final product is an intriguing and delicious spirit that serves up notes of dry smoke, vanilla, dark chocolate chips, some slight peat, dried fruits, molasses, toasted nuts, a little burnt oak, pineapple, mango, banana, slight brown sugar, dark oak, and a drying, spicy finish.

Just 12,000 bottles were produced per small batch limited edition.

• Product type
  Dark
• Distillery / brand
  Havana Club
• Country
  Cuba
• Bottler
  Distillery Bottling
• Non-chillfiltered
  No
• Natural colour
  No
• SKU
  041658