The Still & The VineSchool of Wine & Spirits
Plantation Stiggins' Fancy Pineapple

Plantation Stiggins' Fancy Pineapple

Maison Ferrand · Maison Ferrand, Ars, France (blending and infusion) using Caribbean base rums

$2880 (40% ABV) proofBlend aged 3 months in oak after infusionPlantation's Stiggins' Fancy was born from a historical obsession. Maison Ferrand's Alexandre Gabriel and cocktail historian David Wondrich discovered nineteenth-century recipes for pineapple rum — buried in the 1824 English Journal of Patent and Inventions and the 1844 Journal of Agricultural Society — and set out to recreate the Victorian-era practice using modern distillation and real Queen Victoria pineapples. The name honors Reverend Stiggins from Dickens' The Pickwick Papers, a character famously fond of pineapple rum.
Before Stiggins' Fancy, flavored rum meant artificial sweeteners and neon colors. Alexandre Gabriel and David Wondrich's experiment asked a different question: what if you used real fruit, real distillation, and treated infusion as seriously as barrel aging? The dual-infusion method — rinds distilled for bright aromatics, fruit macerated in dark rum for depth — is an engineering solution to a flavor problem. The result is a rum that tastes genuinely of pineapple without tasting like a pineapple candy. It proved that the flavored spirits category could be legitimate, and it changed the conversation for every brand that followed.

Kit Aromas

Tasting Notes

Nose

Fresh pineapple leaps from the glass — ripe, tropical, and unmistakable — followed by banana, demerara sugar, clove, cinnamon, and black pepper spice.

Palate

Rich and layered with authentic pineapple flavor supported by dark brown sugar, toffee, and warm baking spices. The dual-infusion technique gives both bright tropical fruit from the rind distillation and deep, jammy sweetness from the dark rum fruit maceration.

Finish

Long and slightly dry with lingering spice, a touch of acidity, and pineapple that persists as a top note over a base of brown sugar and oak.

Specifications
Base Ingredient
Dual infusion: pineapple rinds in Plantation 3 Stars white rum (pot-distilled), fruit flesh in Plantation Original Dark rum
Distillation
Rind infusion redistilled in Ferrand copper pot stills; fruit infusion left intact; both blended and rested in oak
Serve & Pair

Cocktail Suggestion

Cocktail — The Dickens Daiquiri: 2 oz Plantation Pineapple, 0.75 oz fresh lime juice, 0.5 oz rich demerara syrup, 2 dashes Angostura bitters. Shake with ice, double-strain into a chilled coupe, garnish with a dehydrated pineapple ring.

Food Pairing

Pair with: Grilled pineapple with coconut cream and toasted macadamia nuts — the caramelized fruit amplifies the rum's pineapple, while the coconut and nut add tropical richness.

Train These Aromas
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