J Gow Wild Yeast Series NMO 2020
J Gow Wild Yeast Series NMO 2020. We are back in bonny Scotland, well more accurately the Orkney Islands and the small island of Lamb Holm. Which is where Collin Van Schayk has decided to set up a rum distillery.
This may seem a very odd decision but Collin’s father Emile owns the award winning Orkney Wine Company so a career in the “booze” industry was perhaps his destiny.
As the title suggests this is a rum produced using “Wild Yeast”. As possibly the least geeky rum geek in the world I will at this stage hand over to Collin to give some background on this aspect of the rum
“J Gow NMO 2020 our first unaged release and the first wild yeast release from the distillery. Orkney doesn’t have a climate for growing sugar cane, but we wanted to use something local and unique. What better than a native yeast harvested from wild Northern marsh orchids that grow right beside the distillery.
Various mini ferments were setup with petals or swabs taken from the flowers. Successful ferments (and those that didn’t smell awful) were then isolated and scaled up from 50ml starter fermentations, all the way up, to grow enough yeast to then ferment 2,000L.
It even involved counting active yeasts cells under a microscope. To calculate how many litres of yeast were required to ferment a full size batch. It was a long process. Fermentation eventually took place in March 2021 and lasted 31 days, our longest fermentation yet. The yeast itself smelled completely different to the commercial yeasts we use for our main products.
This alongside the extra long fermentation created a high ester, fruity, naturally sweet spirit. We decided not to age in oak but to let the flavours created by the wild yeast speak for itself. It was rested for several months in a stainless steel tank and slowly cut down to an ABV of 58.8% (as we are at 58.8° North here on Lamb Holm).
This is the first release in our wild yeast series. We isolated a different strain from orchids again in 2021. Which was very mango forward, but much heavier this has been filled into ex-moscatel octave casks for a future release.
We’ll try to do an annual experimental batch with wild yeasts isolated from the island. We’ve also banked each of these strains and frozen them, so we should be able to replicate them again at any time.”
Collin has also added a little addendum as well, to help explain things that some people will find “unusual”…..
*Due to it being non chill filtered and the heavier flavour of this rum some flocculation may appear in the bottle at colder temperatures. These are flavour particles and heavier oils coming out of solution and nothing to worry about. Bringing the bottle back up to room temperature and giving it a gentle shake should disperse most particles present.
So there you go. Nice little background into the process behind this rum.
So that leaves me to pretty much set out the facts around my particular bottle. I have bottle number 13 of only 171 bottles. The front label of J Gow Wild Yeast Series NMO 2020, notes that it is a “Unaged Scottish Pure Single Rum” (they are trying to run with the Gargano classification). It has been bottled at 58.8% ABV.
The wild yeast was harvested 9th July 2020
Fermentation Date 9th March 2021. Fermentation lasted 31 days.
Distillation Date was 14th April 2021
Distillation is Single Pass.
I’m not sure what other information you might be needing at this point? Oh yes maybe how to get hold of a bottle. It was released to those signed up to the J Gow mailing list on Friday 10th March 2022. It will go on general release (for the remaining bottles) on Wednesday 16th March. A few bottles are going to Royal Mile Whiskies but your best chance it to try the official site for online sales at least. It is priced at £45 for a 70cl bottle. You could say that is pricy for an unaged spirit but I think we need to take into account the small scale of this release and as outlined above – the amount of work that has went into it.
With that in mind I think we should have a dive into this unaged rum and see if it merits the £45 price tag.
I always f
ind pouring a crystal clear spirit into the glass – knowing its not vodka slightly amusing. I often give my wife a glass to sniff (she is a vodka drinker and really not very fond of rum) and she recoils with repulsion. Which for me is always a good sign. She pretty much tried to ban J Wray and Nephew from the house on account of its pungent aroma…
On the nose I’m getting thick, heavy, treacly molasses. It’s odd but the rum smells oily and heavy. It’s a real nose tingler. Beneath this I’m getting an almost Sugar Cane sweetness similar to an agricole or perhaps more accurately much like a Clairin from Haiti.
There’s a grassy element, a herbal touch of pine cones. What I am noticing more and more with time in the glass though is the fruity element.
Or more accurately the slightly fermented “dunder” like fruitiness. It’s almost Jamaican in many ways with masses of fermented pineapple, bruised almost spoilt banana and a lighter sweeter burst of raspberry and strawberry.
It really mellows in the glass – either that or its just wrecked my nostrils……….
I enjoy sipping unaged white rum. Not your supermarket rubbish and perhaps not your standard white “rum”. More a Clairin or a Cachaca or (especially) an unaged White Agricole Rhum. The sweet sugar cane and grassy notes really appeal. Despite this being made with molasses I am getting that kind of vibe alongside a good chunk of Jamaican funk.
Sipped J Gow Wild Yeast Series NMO 2020 is obviously not your well aged, sophisticated sipping spirit. It’s not sweet and smooth as many would want….
What it is though is a full on flavour bomb with lashings of molasses, caramel and toffee to begin with. Followed by sweeter, almost grassy notes mixed alongside some heavy fermented fruity notes – stoned fruits, pineapple, lots of pineapple, touches of banana and as you move towards the finish a sweet note of strawberry.
The mouthfeel is thick and oily and very satisfying. It coats every inch of your mouth and leaves a big “mouthsmack” kind of feel behind.
It’s big and quite boozy as well all the way through. As a mixer it will probably need to be used sparingly (he says nursing a huge rum and coke made with it) or it might well blow your head off.
There have been some really good unaged white rums come out of Scotland over the past few years in the shape of Ninefold and Sugar House. Nothing though has been bottled at this kind of ABV.
It certainly works and whilst Scotland might not be the best place in the world for ageing rum or producing sugar cane. In the care of a good distiller it can certainly produce an unaged product on a par with anywhere else in the world.
Finish wise due to the intensity of flavour on the initial entry and mid palate it does stick around for a while. Nice notes of molasses and pineapple linger for a long while.
You don’t want to try kissing the wife after a glass of this……..
A new Caribbean Island for me with this particular rum (not that I’ve visited any yet!). St Vincent Distillers Limited produce Captain Bligh XO Reserve Rum amongst others such as Sparrow’s and Sunset Light Rum.
All in all the rum is nicely presented and the cardboard sleeve is a bonus, however it takes a turn for the worst when you remove the purple wrapping from what I had assumed was the corked enclosure. It’s a metallic screw top and to be honest its a pretty cheap one at that. Up to now most of my displeasure at the Captain Bligh was aimed at the fact it had been named the best rum in the world in some very questionable competition. Now I’m kind of annoyed that I researched the internet for Captain Bligh when I had the information in front of me and I’ve been tricked into thinking I was getting a nice cork. There is something to be said for the pop of a cork and the beautiful aroma that follows. Something I might make SVDL aware of!
The Real McCoy Aged 14 Years Limited Edition. It has been pretty difficult, make that nigh on impossible to keep track of every bottling that has hailed from Foursquare over the past few years. There are a huge variety of Official Bottlings (OB’s), Independent Bottlings (IB’s), collaborations between OB’s and IB’s and finally Rum Brands such as 
So what do we have here exactly? Well we have a blend of Pot and Column distilled Barbados rum from the Foursquare Rum Distillery. It has been aged for 14 years in ex-bourbon casks at the distillery. It is distilled, aged, blended and bottled at Foursquare. I know because the labels tell me this.
Finish wise it’s a nice length and it fades out gently with a really nice balance of spice, oak, fruitiness, with just enough vanilla and coconut to keep the sweetness going.
Plantation’s line of rums are multi award winning and feature regularly at events around the world. They are a very active, if relatively new player (if we trace rum back to 1703 certainly) in the rum world.
review shows, I was less than enthused. It was very average. I was quite surprised and very disappointed with it. I’m hoping that Plantation’s double ageing techniques will add an extra dimension to this rum.
The flavour of the Nicaragua Old Reserve is similar to the nose and offers few surprises. Sweet brown sugar almost honey like notes a little nuttiness and a nice rich oaky vanilla note on the finish. Upfront the rum is initially very sweet but fades nicely into light vanilla notes and then a very pleasant oaky aftertaste with quite a long finish.
Mezan Diamond Distillery Guyana 2007 PX Cask Finish. I’ve not been reviewing a great deal of Independent Bottlings of late. I’m not going to pretend I’m wearing some kind of halo and advocating Distillery Bottlings. Thing is though, with the likes of Foursquare, Worthy Park and Hampden Estate producing so many of their own bottlings over the past few years, I’ve found my buying habits pointing more in that direction.
rum was moved into an PX Sherry cask for the “finish” or secondary maturation. It was distilled in 2007 and bottled in 2019 and is noted as being aged 12 years. It was aged in Europe for 9 of these years. All this information is provided on the bottles rear label. As you can see.
There is so much going on with this rum, it’s difficult to describe everything that you will encounter. This drinks more like a Tropically Aged Demerara than a lot of other IB’s, I have had recently. This is a rich, fruity rum which shows just how rum really doesn’t need to be artificially sweetened. A secondary maturation or finish in a quality cask will give you all the sweetness you need.
Ninefold Scottish Oak Aged 3 Years
, in a excerpt taken direct from the Ninefold Website. Further information and a longer explanation on the origin of the Scottish Oak can be found at 
Velier Royal Navy Tiger Shark. The second installment in Velier’s “Velier Royal Navy” series of rums. I was first introducted to this in October at London Rumfest, at a Velier seminar.
orange tinge. Nosing the rum I am immediately left thinking what I thought back in October. Worthy Park. The distinctive banana, tea and chocolate notes are predominant on the nose.
Finish wise its big and long lasting on the palate. Lots of rich fruity notes such as blackcurrant and raisin, mingle alongside a lot of spicy oak – all spice, ginger and some hints of clove. An after taste of slightly stewed breakfast tea stays in the mouth alongside some banana and dark chocolate.