This is Worthy Park. Apparently, they have restricted the use of their brand name, which is a pretty stupid move that a few arrogant Scots – their name escape me - have been trying to do for ages. Alert, dead-end street! Colour: deep gold. Nose: menthol and liquorice, acetone and ammonia, green walnuts, mustard, olives, overripe bananas. With water: same. New plywood at Ikea's, new plastics, new Tesla, leatherette… Mouth (neat): so very good, acetone-y at first, ultra-dry and grassy, then marvellously liquoricy and salty. With water: Worthy Park as usual. Salty, olive-y, tarry, with rotting bananas at the fruit section. A little stewed cabbage, perhaps. Finish: long, focused, salty, tarry. Tiny pickled lemons in the aftertaste. Comments: I don't quite remember which distillery this was stemming from, but it's wonderful high-ester rum for sure. Monymusk, am I wrong? In any case, an Islayfication of Jamaica by the owners would not be such a good idea, if you ask me. Way too soon! Wait, wasn't this Long Pond? High-ester Appleton?
Gal Granov (88)
Time for another Rum coming from our friend Nils of the Duchess NL. this time he’s bottled a 14 yo Worthy park 14 which can not be named WP, thus they are calling it Luidas Vale which is essentially where WP is.
Nose: Quite intense with a wide array of notes: starting on licorice, Olive brine, mint, and also overripe banana, pepper, and acetone, some spent motor oil as well, with a nice touch of oak, wet paint, and more of the over-ripe Pineapple in yogurt cream, the sweetness if almost over the top.
Palate: Sweet and hot, with more of the Acetone from the nose, licorice sweets, which start off sweet, then turn to salty caramel, more of the almost too ripe Banana and pineapple compote, leather, and more olive brine, turmeric, pepper, and rubber galore, very sweet and very distinct- lovely. with water: the pepper is amplified, so is the rubber and licorice while the fruit is toned down a bit (I prefer this sans aqua).
Finish: salt, pepper, some flowery notes as well as the banana/pineapple with ample wood spices and licorice, maybe a touch of tar.
Again, this is a belter of a Rum- love the overripe fruit along with the tar, pepper, licorice, acetone, and spices. So rich. So good. if you’re a WP fan – you’re going to love this one. € 67,70 which is also a great price.
Good work. Highly recommended, and very good VFM.
Malt Fascination (87)
.com
While the brand ‘Worthy Park’ goes back to 1720, the current rum distillery on the premises only started production in 2005. It’s quite a modern plant compared to what you (I, at least) generally expect when talking about rum production.
They stopped producing rum in 1962 because of over production and far less consumption since World War 2.
The style of distillation is a lot closer to how Scotland distills its whiskies with the copper pot still being from Forsyths in Rothes, Scotland. The estate is run by the Clarke family since 1918.
Sniff:
Intense with lots of sweetness. Sugarcane with other vegetal hints. Burnt sugar, with quite some oak too.
Sip:
The palate is a bit more thin than I expected. There’s peppery heat and dry oak. Sugarcane, vegetables, red paprika, caramel.
Swallow:
The finish is a bit more typical, but also has strong coffee treacle, molasses.
This too is an interesting drink. It’s a bit inconsistent with the vegetal notes on the nose and palate, changing gears into coffee treacle on the finish. It’s a different take on rum, once again.
What I like is that the sweetness of the nose isn’t directly present on the palate, because that might have been a bit much.
BOW (90)
Aged for 10 years in Jamaica then shipped to Europe for further maturation
- No Additives
- No Colouring
- 100% Molasses
- Pot still
