El Dorado Single Still Port Mourant 2009
El Dorado · Diamond Distillery (Demerara Distillers Ltd.)
A profound showcase of the last operating wooden double pot still on Earth. Its opposing forces — sweet tropical fruit against dry, resinous funk — resolve into something singular and haunting. Essential drinking for anyone serious about heritage rum.
Nose
Immediate hit of pencil shavings, licorice root, and dark molasses, giving way to overripe banana, damp earth, and a whiff of anise. There's a savory, almost briny undercurrent alongside sweet toffee and dried fig.
Palate
Oily and full-bodied, the palate opens with concentrated muscovado sugar and burnt caramel before pivoting to bitter cocoa, black tea, and camphor. Mid-palate reveals prune, black cherry, and that unmistakable Port Mourant wooden pot-still funk — resinous, herbaceous, and layered.
Finish
Long and drying, with lingering espresso, tobacco leaf, and a faint medicinal note of eucalyptus. The sweetness recedes to leave charred oak and licorice.
- Base Ingredient
- Molasses from Demerara sugarcane
- Distillation
- Double wooden pot still (the historic Port Mourant still), aged tropically in ex-bourbon casks in Guyana
- Country
- Georgetown, Guyana
Cocktail Suggestion
The Demerara Duality — 2 oz El Dorado Single Still Port Mourant, 0.75 oz fresh lime juice, 0.5 oz demerara syrup (2:1), 0.25 oz Amaro Nonino, 2 dashes Angostura bitters. Shake with ice, strain into a chilled coupe, garnish with an expressed orange peel.
Food Pairing
Dark chocolate torte with candied orange peel, or a hard aged Manchego drizzled with fig preserves.
Distilled on the double wooden pot still originally built at the Port Mourant estate in 1732 and now preserved at Diamond — the last of its kind in the world, and the beating heart of Guyanese rum heritage.
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