Decoding Guyana's Estates and Stills
One advantage of rum from independent bottlers is that the label usually says which distillery made it. Many Caribbean distilleries have distinct flavor profiles, so this information can provide a strong clue regarding how the rum in a bottle tastes. When a bottle says “Made at Worthy Park,” you generally know what to expect, assuming you’ve had prior experience with other Worthy Park rums.
However, the usefulness of the distillery name in isolation breaks down when the distillery makes many different marks and/or uses widely different stills. One example is Hampden Estate, which makes eight distinct marks in its pot stills, ranging from the relatively light OWH to the extreme DOK. Fortunately, independent bottlers often specify which mark is in the bottle, e.g., LROK, HLCF, or DOK.
Another example is St. Lucia Distillers. Its Vendome pot still creates a heavier, more phenolic rum than the adjacent John Dore pot stills or Coffey still. While the distillery’s marks aren’t well known, rum geeks know the flavor profile of each still. If you’re paying a premium price for a limited edition rum, you want to know which stills (or stills) contributed to the liquid in the bottle. Fortunately, many limited edition St. Lucia Distillers bottlings indicate this information on the label.
So far, so good. But when it comes to vintage rum from Guyana’s Demerara Distillers Ltd, decoding a label can be anything but straightforward due to a unique confluence of events. When it comes to Demerara rum, which still made the rum is more important than which distillery it resides at.
If we go back in time to 1993, Demerara Distillers was operating three distilleries – Uitvlugt, Enmore, and Diamond. Four historically important stills operated at either Uitvlugt or Enmore that year:
Port Mourant wooden vat
Versailles wooden vat
Enmore wooden Coffey column
Savalle column
When Enmore closed in 1994, the Enmore Coffey and Versailles joined the Port Mourant and Savalle stills at the Uitvlugt distillery. Six years later, all four stills moved across the Demerara River to Diamond, where they still operate today.
Quite a few independent bottlers sell rums distilled before 2000 and labeled as simply “Uitvlugt” or “Uitvlugt distillery.” What are we to make of this? The rum might be a heavy beast from the Port Mourant still or something entirely different from the Savalle column. Even if a label states pot distillation, the rum could be either Port Mourant or Versailles distillate. Likewise, if we’re told the rum is column distilled, it could be from either the Enmore or Savalle still.
The potential for confusion isn’t limited to Uitvlugt. An Enmore label presents similar challenges. If it says “Enmore” does it mean Enmore Estate or the Enmore wooden Coffey still? Even if it says Enmore Estate, we don’t know whether it’s from the Enmore Coffey or the Versailles wooden vat still.
All of the above might be of minor significance if there wasn’t so much rum distilled at Enmore and Uitvlugt available today. Some independent bottlers helpfully convey the still or rum mark. But when this information isn’t available, it becomes a puzzle to determine what’s in the bottle.
If you find yourself in such a situation, refer to the information below regarding where each of the four historic Demerara Distillers stills has resided in recent decades.
Uitvlugt Estate (Closed in 1999-2000)
Enmore wooden column: 1994-2000
Port Mourant wooden vat: 1968-2000
Savalle column: 1921-2000
Versailles wooden vat: 1994-2000
Enmore Estate (Closed in 1994)
Enmore wooden column: 1880-1994
Versailles wooden vat: 1978-1994
Diamond Estate (Still in Operation)
Enmore wooden column: 2000-present
Port Mourant wooden vat: 2000-present
Savalle column: 2000-present
Versailles wooden vat: 2000-present
Diamond Coffey: 1950-present
Guyana