Brewery: Innis & Gunn
Location: Edinburgh, Scotland
ABV: 7.4%
Version: Bottled
Source: Courtesy of Innis & Gunn

The Rum Cask finish is a limited edition bottling from Innis & Gunn that’s finished in oak barrels which previously contained navy rum. I&G explains the process on their website: “Maturation in special oak barrels imparts Navy rums with the sweet, spicy character for which they are renowned … We brewed a special batch of Innis & Gunn beer and matured it in oak for 60 days. Every single drop spent half of that time in American oak barrels before being refilled into selected navy rum barrels to finish the lengthy maturation. Once the beer had absorbed the unique character the barrels were emptied, the beer blended and then maturation continued for a further 47 days until all of the flavours had married together and mellowed.” Total maturation time: 107 days.

That aforementioned spicy-sweetness is distinctly noticeable: as well as being darker in colour, Rum Cask I&G is also much sweeter than their standard Oak Aged Ale and there was definitely a faint spiciness in there – the rum really stamping its character on the beer from the first impression onwards. Check out the spidergraph on the I&G website for more info on what you might expect.

I have to admit, I’m not a huge fan of rum in its own right – when it comes to spirits I much prefer whisky (or whiskey) or even bourbon at a push – and I think my impression of this brew was coloured by that. All in all, this one was drinkable and interesting enough, but I definitely preferred the Canadian Cask finish that I tried just before it. The Rum Cask is still a big, smooth, flavourful beer, but the given the choice of two, I’d go for the Canadian every time. Shame it’s only available on export.

Anyhow, another big thank you to Nicky at Innis & Gunn’s PR agency R&R Teamwork for sending this one along for me to try!