Dupré Barbancourt, who founded the company in 1862, came to Haiti from Charente, which is located in the Cognac region of France. Using double distillation methods, originally used in the production of cognac in France, he began distilling rum after perfecting his special recipe. Barbancourt was married to Nathalie Gardère, who after Barbancourt’s death took control of the business. Later, on her deathbed, Nathalie Gardère left the company to her nephew Paul Gardère, as she never had children with Dupré Barbancourt. To this day the rum business remains in the Gardére family.

Rhum Barbancourt Réserve Spéciale is an agricultural rum made from freshly pressed sugar cane juice that is distilled to 90% alcohol. The distilled product is cut with water before it is put to rest in large white Limousin oak vats. The finished product is an 8 year old rum, 43% alcohol per volume.

Rhum Barbancourt is the most internationally decorated rum and the people at Barbancourt are proud to show it as the label is decorated with multiple medals won from various competitions. The label has a total of 22 medals - two medals under and ten medals to the left and right of the blue star that is supposedly a symbol of a Voodoo god (waiting confirmation from Barbancourt). You can view all the awards and medals at the Barbancourt website.

El Dorado, the name conjures images of the mythical city of gold ruled by El Rey Dorado, The Golden King. A legend of a South American tribal chieftain, who would be completely covered in gold dust as part of an ancient ritual. The chieftain would travel with a decorated raft to the middle of a gigantic lake and offer a sacrifice of gold to the god-monster they believed lived in the lake. With this ritual the chieftain was recognized as king.

Many have died searching for the gold of El Dorado. Tonight I get to be one of the explorers searching for the gold, hopefully with better luck.

El Dorado Special Reserve 15 Years is packaged in a box embossed with gold-lettering and decorated with pictures of Brigs sailing on the great Demerara River. The bottle itself is an attractive green glass bottle reminiscent of the hand blown flasks used in the navy centuries ago. The label features the same Brigs on the great Demerara River as seen on the box. The bottle also has a plastic seal with gold colouring that glistens in the light like the real thing.

The very first rum I reviewed was Havana Club Añejo 7 Años and I felt it was time to review another product from the Havana Club range as people had been requesting more Havana Club rum reviews. This time I will let you in on what Havana Club Cuban Barrel Proof holds within its decorated, blue labelled bottle.

Hand-crafted by "Maestro Ronero" Don Navarro, Cuban Barrel Proof is made from a blend of different aged rums aged in extra-old white oak barrels. This blend is then put to rest in younger oak casks or "finish" casks and finally bottled straight from the cask at 45% without being diluted with water. This is what makes this rum 'barrel proof' or 'cask strength'. Havana Club don’t publicise the average age of the blend or the time this blend is allowed to age in the younger oak casks, so unfortunately these details will remain a mystery.

Temptryst rums are produced by Texas based Au Natural Spirits Inc, which is run by the president and head of research, Daniel Watson. Coveted by the connoisseurs at the Ministry of Rum and Refined Vices, Temptryst rums have quickly gained a reputation despite the fact that these rums are still relatively unknown to the wider audience and not yet on the market. For instance Cherry Wood XO won a gold award at the Ministry of Rum tasting competition amongst other award winning Temptryst rums. Such appreciation can only promise good fortune for the upcoming rum brand.

I've read a lot about Daniel Watson’s interesting line of rums such as the Cherry Wood, Mesquite and the Lemon Wood that was gifted to me by Mr. Watson, which has left me honoured to be the first one to be reviewing his first Lemon Wood batch today.

The review of Jameson Irish Whiskey this week is a special one because instead of one review you will get to read two reviews written by me and our guest writer Esteban Fontsworth. On top of that at the end of my review I’ve written a short comparison between oxidised Jameson and fresh Jameson. Some of you may wonder what it means for a spirit to be oxidised but read on and all shall be revealed.

History

Scot John Jameson moved to Dublin in the 1770's and went on to found one of Ireland’s first legal distilleries in 1780. He went on to acquire more distilleries and was once able to claim he had more than one million gallons of whiskey aging in Dublin.

The Jameson bottle is made of green glass, which is quite apt for an Irish whiskey. The label sports the Jameson family crest that says Sine Metu, which is Latin and means "without fear." This crest was awarded by the monarchy to John Jameson’s forefathers for capturing pirate ships on the west coast of Scotland. Sine Metu is seen on all Jameson bottles today.

One other thing that I found interesting is the code JQ-058548, which appears to be on every Jameson bottle I've seen. So far I've not found any information about this mysterious number but should you know anything about it please post about it in the forums or contact me using the contact form.

Santa Teresa 1796 Ron Antiguo de Solera was launched in 1996 to commemorate the 200th anniversary of Hacienda Santa Teresa. The bottle is packed inside a blue cardboard tube decorated with a red ribbon and a red plastic seal that reads 1796. The bottle itself is tall and elegant sealed with red wax going all the way from over the cork down to the neck. Around the neck is a booklet, which, on this particular bottle, is written entirely in Spanish as are the old looking labels on the bottle which have the same descriptions as the booklet.

As one might guess from the name and the descriptions, Santa Teresa uses an aging process called the solera method.

Hacienda Santa Teresa is the first and one of the few distilleries to make use of this unique aging method to age rum today. The solera method was used for aging sherry in the mid 19th century, though it is believed it was developed sometime before then. The idea behind the process is for the rum to take different characteristics from older rums.