PLANTATION is a rather interesting brand: the company is owned by France’s Cognac Ferrand, and sort of “collects” rums from a host of Caribbean islands.

Each rum, which the company considers a “grand cru,” is labeled as Plantation and the name of the country in which it was produced — Plantation Barbados, Plantation Grenada, Plantation Guadeloupe, etc.

The collection was born out of Cognac Ferrand’s relationships with Caribbean distilleries, which had used its barrels for aging.

According to Plantation, the Plantation Collection came about when a number of rums that had been kept by the Caribbean distilleries’ cellar masters soon ended up being bottled by Ferrand.

The result? Superb.

Most recently, we tried the Plantation XO Barbados 20th Anniversary rum which is, in a word, spectacular.

Plantation says the rum is made from “some of its earliest reserves,” which aged in bourbon and then in French oak barrels.

Its colour is a perfect amber, with an aroma of toffee and caramel.

The rum has notes of dried banana, caramel, molasses and dried cherry.

It might be the smoothest rum on the market — anywhere. And it’s also versatile — equally at home as an aperitif or a digestif, both drinkable and delectable.

It’s simply that good.

— CJ