Cuba 1998 II Release is a single cask selected by Samaroli and bottled in 2015 from cask #54. The source distillery is not named, which is normal for this type of independent stock; the important facts are vintage, cask and bottler. Released at 45% volume, with 260 bottles. MATURATION: the spirit spent seventeen years in cask before Samaroli chose it for the second release. The style is not about brute strength. It is a composed, dry, column-still island profile, shaped for clarity rather than force. SERVING: pour neat at room temperature in a small tulip glass. No ice, no mixer, no water unless the glass has been open for a while. Best beside espresso, almond biscotti or high-cacao chocolate.
Tasting notes
Bright amber.
Vanilla pod, cane syrup, orange peel, cedar, beeswax, blond tobacco and soft leather.
Dry, calm and polished; honeyed cane, toasted almond, cocoa skin and gentle oak.
Clean medium finish with orange oil, tea leaf, cedar dust and restrained spice.
Silvano Samaroli founded his independent bottling house in 1968 with a collector's eye rather than a volume merchant's logic. His rum selections became important because they treated casks as individual voices: sparse labels, precise releases, and no need to disguise origin gaps with invented romance. Later Samaroli bottlings still follow that discipline, placing trust in provenance, texture and restraint instead of loud branding.
