Caroni Tortuga no.2 23 Year 1998 Cask # 35 700mL

The second Tortuga release: Caroni cask 35, distilled in 1998 and bottled in 2021 at 59.9% after 23 years. Compared with No.1 it is the gentler of the pair, with more fruit and vanilla up front.

About This Rum

Cask 35 was selected by Precious Liquors and released with East Asia Whisky Co. under the Tortuga name, again in support of The Sea Turtle Conservancy. It is a molasses rum from the 1998 distillation, bottled at cask strength with a light copper colour. Reviewers have compared it with the first Tortuga and found it sweeter and better balanced, the exhaust and rubber notes sitting behind baked banana, pineapple and cigar box.

Tasting Profile

• Nose: Vanilla first, then roasted strawberry, brown sugar, baked banana and pineapple, with new tyre and polished copper in the background.
• Palate: Sweet and rounded: overripe pineapple, leather, caramel and peppermint, then smoky chocolate and a citrus edge.
• Finish: Salty and drawn out, with roasted nuts, pepper, mint and burnt vanilla pastry.

Serving & Food

Pour at cool room temperature into a Glencairn and allow ten minutes in the glass. It drinks well at full strength, though a drop of water brings out the fruit. Excellent by the fire with a cigar, or beside crème brûlée or pecan pie.

How to Enjoy

Someone new to heavy Caroni who wants a softer way in, or a two-glass comparison with Tortuga No.1.

Product Details

About the Distillery

Precious Liquors is an independent bottler of single casks, and it has worked with several Asian partners, including East Asia Whisky Co. and the Singapore bar The Auld Alliance.

The Caroni casks it has bottled belong to the last years of the distillery. Rum from 1998 was made only a few seasons before closure, when the plant was already running on imported molasses, and those late vintages have produced several well-reviewed single casks.