We're back with another of Distilia's flagship series - one that has been quite popular for its extensive range and collection of Guyana's Demerara rums - the Greenheart Collection. Distilia, of course being well-regarded purveyors and independent bottlers of rums, whiskies and cognacs, and also run Whiskymarket.com.

Greenheart is the name of a special wood that is indigenous to Guyana, and is one of the stiffest woods in the world, so much so that standard tools simply aren't enough to work with the wood. This unique property has made the Greenheart wood prime candidate for some really interesting uses, such as being used in the Fram and Endurance ships that were used by Arctic pioneering explorers Amundsen and Shackleton in their polar expeditions.

Another interesting use of the Greenheart wood is of course that of Guyana's Demerara Distiller's heritage stills - distillation stills that were made primarily of the special wood rather than metal. Just give that some thought - it truly is a phenomenal feat to rigorously heat the fermented material in a wooden vessel and have it still be functional today since the 1700's, making the wooden still over 250 years old!

Polar explorer Shackleton famously used Greenheart wood to bolster his ship against the ice. (Image Source: Wikipedia)

This is of course not a purely engineering and historical feat, but also plays a major influence on the unique flavours of the rums created that has made the Demerara rums so well-regarded.

Distilia has amassed a serious collection of these Demerara rums - all incredibly well-aged, with 5 expressions made with the Versailles Still from the historic Enmore Distillery, and 1 expression made using the Port Mourant Still from another historic Guyanese distillery, Uitvlugt. Today, these historical wooden stills have all been consolidated into a single major distillery complex known as Diamond that is the only distillery left on Guyana, with the rest having been shuttered.

We've got an amazing line-up, so sit tight and come along for the ride! 

Port Mourant 1989, 31 Years Old, Uitvlugt, Greenheart Collection - Review

Tasting Notes

Color: Amber

Aroma: Dense notes of sarsaparilla and liquorice, with more on eucalyptus and alittle bit of citrus zest. There’s a touch of incense and coffee aromas. More on root beer fizz.

Taste: A lot more expressive and powerful - a combination of spiced honey, cough syrup and root beer float. It gets brighter with more on milk coffee, before turning more medicinal and herbaceous - parsley. It’s broadly sweet, bright and silky. 

Finish: More licorice before turning towards milk coffee and slightly more oaky tannins.

My Thoughts

This was lighter than the Enmore’s, and while it demonstrated a fair bit of complexity, it’s a lot more beginner friendly and accessible without taking one too far down the depths of it becoming mind-boggling, too tannic or austere. 

It’s generally sweet and welcoming with a good combination of sweet-herbaceous-bitter that takes turns and is consistent across the tasting experience.

What stood out was the bright, silky quality of the textures on the palate. 

Versailles 1990, 30 Years Old, Enmore, Greenheart Collection - Review

Tasting Notes 

Color: Light Gold

Aroma: Immediately aromatic, deep sarsaparilla, cola and root beer scents, dotted with clove and anise spices, also with a rich honeyed note and more on lacquered wood. Lightly peppery and spicy. As it lets up, poached nectarines and apricots show up, also a little bit of muskiness of jackfruit.

Taste: It starts off with honey but quickly turns smoky and woody, evolving into black coffee, butter, turning more herbaceous of fresh parsley, and more on woody root herbs, dried gentian roots and galangal comes to mind. There’s also a sweet, savouriness of oyster sauce and katsuobushi stock, rich and thick.

Finish: The smokiness persists, of charred wood, bringing forth more notes of Pei Pa Koa cough syrup, coffee, and more medicinal dried ginseng slices. There’s a light savouriness and saltiness as well. Such a deep, rich toasty, toasty herbal aroma - almost reminiscent of Imperial Stout, with a little bit of burnt toast. It has a light astringency but in the most gentle and yet full palate encompassing way. There’s remnants of that sarsaparilla and root beer cola from the aromas making its way here. 

My Thoughts

The sheer complexity and evolutions this undergoes is just incredible - it has so much robustness and verve, an incredibly bold and powerful rum that expresses itself incredibly well. Through it all, through its shapeshifting, it retains this deep richness that is just evocative of its long time in wood and intense climates. It interweaves between herbal, earthy, medicinal sweetness and smoky, woody, umami and savoury notes. Both equally well-defined, developed and charged and weaving in and out of one another - it’s so hard to pinpoint and say which of the dualities it is.

This is well and truly a stellar Demerara that demonstrates so much power and finesse, and at the same time has rounded itself out so harmoniously, and packs not the slightest heat or sign of sharpness.

Versailles MEV 1985, 36 Years Old, Enmore, Greenheart Collection - Review

Tasting Notes

Color: Canola

Aroma: Deep, sweet honey and woody but also herbal notes, turning slightly more herbaceous with time, opening up to a fresh bouquet of parsley and coriander. More on vanilla cream, licorice, that smoky wood char, and a light touch of anise, fennel and cardamom. It grows to this really fresh greenness of fresh herbs. Over time it gets sweeter still - manuka honey and eucalyptus, but still maintaining that brightness of fresh herbs.

Taste: Initially it starts off fairly easy - brighter, lighter notes of honey, but quickly accelerates into this deep honeyed, resinous, woodiness. There’s a quick flash of bitterness that comes alongside it - a nutty astringency, walnuts probably. That classic smoky wood, developing into that phenomenal coffee flavour that is just so unique to Enmore. This is combined with more medicinal - cough medicine, earthy notes of herbaceous roots and soil, dried mushrooms - this deep savoury, medicinal bitterness. 

Finish: It eases back up and takes us back to more comfortable territory - sweeter, brighter honey, with just a little wink of those smoky wood and coffee notes almost as if pretending what happened on the palate was just a dream. Light final touches of licorice. Only lightly drying. 

My Thoughts

I can assure you, no matter how many times a person savours a rum from Enmore, it will always blow you away with not just the boldness and power of it all, not to mention the complexity, but just how distinct that smoky woody and coffee note is on the palate - it always makes you stop and wonder just how did they achieve something like this. Yeah, yeah, we know it in theory, but still the flavours are always just spectacular.

But of course, while Enmore’s feature this quality as a mark of its signature style, we can only tell how good it is but its execution - which in the case of this expression was just phenomenal. It was incredibly elegant, and moved from one profile to the next so seamlessly, with no off notes. Bear in mind the spectrum is traverses, it is no small feat to weave end to end in a cohesive manner that is balanced and yet vibrant. For lack of better words, this wasn’t one of those dank Enmore’s that go too heavy on any one part.

This gave me world class ballet vibes - perfect orchestration, everything was so perfectly cohesive and synchronised, one note to the next all powering you through from aroma to finish.

Versailles MEV 1990, 31 Years Old, Enmore, Greenheart Collection - Review

Tasting Notes 

Color: Light Gold

Aroma: A mix of old wood, herbal roots, a light touch of sarsaparilla, lightly smoky too. It’s somewhat resinous and tannic, with a faint astringency. It’s not as aromatic but quite powerful nonetheless when nosed closer.

Taste: Immediately smoky with a side of salinity - smoked fish, freshly brewed coffee, roasted robusta coffee beans. More on charred wood, fish sauce - quite umami and salty, and then there’s a more squeaky hit of worn rubber tyres and engine smoke. 

Finish: Long drawn warmth, more herbal and earthy with those root-y flavours again. A touch of black coffee, and also really hot milk coffee. Not as tannic here, but there is a touch of oaky bitterness.

My Thoughts

This one’s less expressive on the nose, but comes through more so on the palate. What I really enjoy is that this is more accessible flavour wise and less hot or punchy, which really allows you to lean in and get all those classic Enmore notes. On the palate it leans more towards a smoky, oily salinity, alongside the charred wood, while the coffee notes here are alittle more austere. This one’s more woody too.

Versailles 1988, 32 Years Old, Enmore, Greenheart Collection - Review 

Tasting Notes

Color: Straw

Aroma: Light notes of honey and cane syrup, a light grassiness, with more on sea coconuts - almost alittle rhum agricole like. Turns slightly more earthy and rooty - those sarsaparilla roots, more medicinal herbaceous notes, with a slight smokiness. There’s a light minerality and a touch of sourness reminiscent of unsweetened yogurt or green olives.

Taste: Ooh this one goes straight to it - those coffee notes kick off almost immediately. Those smoky, milk coffee notes that Enmore’s are so known for. Before turning more medicinal and herbaceous and bitter. Just when you thought that transition was over, it takes you even deeper into darker more roasty and intense coffee notes. There’s an umaminess of dried mushrooms too and oily mackerel.

Finish: Still on those slightly bitter medicinal notes, but also replete with that coffee flavour as well, with a slight touch of grass jelly in the mix. Fades into more of those fresh parsley. 

My Thoughts

This one’s a more cut-to-the-main-fight-card sort of expression. It goes straight to that Enmore signature of roast milk coffee notes, and those herbaceous and medicinal bitterness of fresh herbs and dried roots. This is really a more gentle example of Enmore, that is really so enjoyable.

While not as complex, I actually did enjoy this a lot as I found it more straightforward and enjoyable without losing out on any of those classic Enmore flavours. It was also on the whole more easy and gentle to access, with the flavours being gentler and more welcoming. The finish was also quite mellow and again this is without losing any resolution here, which on the whole made it very easy to sip and enjoy without too much head scratching.

Sometimes you don’t want a Rubik’s cube y’know, just something straightforwardly enjoyable hits the spot.

Versailles REV 1994, 28 Years Old, Enmore, Greenheart Collection - Review

Tasting Notes

Color: Copper

Aroma: Deep, rich notes of brown sugar, amalgamated with a slight vinous touch that evolves into more of a sarsaparilla aroma. There’s more on lacquered wood, wood resin, with a light hit of coffee. Incredibly aromatic with a mix of this liquorice and wood resin driven anise squeakiness, a sweetness and a lightly more vegetal musky touch of fresh longan leaves.  

Over time it continues to open up into more of those bright leafy vinous notes but also something of a mix of anise and incense and old furniture in a musty attic or a traditional Chinese medicine shop - it’s just incredibly complex and evocative - wow!

Taste: Very approachable, pouring forth with more of those musky longans, and also taking on more of a lychee flavour, still slightly vegetal and vinous. There’s an interesting grittiness about it reminiscent of coffee grounds, and then more onto sarsaparilla and liquorice. There’s also anise here too. 

It’s mostly sweet, spiced and very fruity, with just a very faint touch of bitterness.

Finish: Really aromatic, still on those longans and lychee notes, with a light bitterness of cooked vine leaves, as well as sarsaparilla and more root herbs. It gets sweeter over time onto more of a root beer flavour with a more confectionary, estery bit of tinned lychees.

My Thoughts

This was by far my favourite! Just incredibly complex and consistent from its aromas to the finish, with so much to offer as it continues to evolve that you could spend so much time nosing it, and just getting in on the palate. Even on the finish, it’s so tasty you almost get lost in it.

What is obviously the standout here is that intense estery fruity notes of lychees and longans that’s both sweet, musky and somewhat vegetal - it is simply divine! That this is the dominating flavour on the palate and finish is just so wonderful.

This is an incredibly evocative rum that just brings you on such a trip and conveys so many experiences all in one. Really spectacular.  

Overall

It's been quite a trip through Demerara's legendary expressions with obviously a great spectrum in particular with the 5 Enmore expressions that we had the fortune to try side by side.

While the Versailles 1988 (Pink Label, 32 Years Old) was such a classic, benchmark expression that sets the reference for all Enmore's, the Versailles 1985 (Grey, 36 Years Old) and 1990 (Blue Label, 30 Years Old) were notches higher in the sheer boldness, power and expressiveness, with the former being lighter and the latter being a touch heavier; and then the Versailles 1990 (Orange Label, 31 Years Old) was more beginner-friendly, although it did get alittle austere towards the finish.

The personal favourite for me was the Versailles 1994 (Brown Label, 28 Years Old), which really blew me away as it was so far out of the nomenclature of Enmore signature flavours - this has musky and estery longans and lychees, which simply dominated and was just spectacularly fruity.

The Port Mourant 1989 (Green Label) also presented a more accessible and beginner friendly Uitvlugt expression that gave you all the signature flavours without getting too tannic or austere, that might throw you off.

If you're interested, definitely check out Distilia for more on their series!

Kanpai!

@111hotpot