Foursquare 2009

Complex - nice burn - not to sweet - delicious sipping rum - opens nicely if you let breathe or with a drop of water

Nose: lots of bourbon qualities. Butterscotch piled onto vanilla. Rich, light fruit. Tinge of coconut. Make this into a candle and sell it in 50 states. Taste: Nearly quintessential rum. Sweet, mouth-watering. Cane sugar. Like a bourbon bloat.

Fine molasses, fruit, and vanilla type notes. Too much heat as is and quite blah on ice. Becoming just a very elegant mixing rum to me...

Deep copper color. The nose has brown sugar, vanilla bean, cloves, butterscotch, pipe tobacco and faint cedar. Heavy, warm mouthfeel. The palate has a lot of brown sugar, vanilla, clove and allspice, with lighter notes of green melon, ripe bananas, maple syrup, dried apricots, a touch of sea salt and maybe... Christmas fruit cake? The finish is long and warm, with more brown sugar, vanilla, salted caramel, baking spices, and light cedar. Overall, not my favorite ECS, but excellent.

Yet another sample from Sooner. Ive been on the fence with 4square so this should decide it. Man the nose on this is nice. Rich and balanced with tropical fruits, light molassass and smoky hogo. You can just smell the quality here with great depth and clarity. Can the palate live up to the glorious nose....almost. Delicious delivery of island sweets and melted caramel with a delicate barrel char. Near perfect amount of hogo petrols and an overall purity to the taste. Just lacking the buttery thickness of some of my fav dosed rums(I realize Im the minority). Great finish with flavors drifting away slowly with elegance ending at sweet pipe tobacco. Top shelf rum and I WILL buy a bottle finally. Easy recommendation for rum sippers(dont mix it)......90/100

120 proof comes in super hot. Firm spiciness and fruit. Nothing stands out in first take... solid but ultimately a bit boring. I liked the Detente next level over this.

Lemon and pine, coconut, anise, light smoke, grass, and dried apricot aroma. Straight vanilla flavor with a touch of anise. Coconut and vanilla finish which really lingers. Smooth for the proof, but the lingering finish is almost too much

Bought this based on @Bourbon_Obsessed_Lexington review. My experience with aged rum is pretty limited - in addition to this, I've tried a private barrel of Privateer, Mount Gay XO, and Smith and Cross. This is clearly better than the MG and S&C (which ended up being a drain pour after coming back to it for over a year - hogoX💯) and more similar in quality to the Privateer. However, the Privateer comes across as hotter despite the proof being essentially the same, I suspect due to the age of the Foursquare versus the Privateer. On the nose I get banana and carmelized brown sugar on pineapple. The palate is full of vanilla and tropical fruit. Drinks more like 50% ABV than 60 - I had to check twice to make sure I wasn't mistaken. in fact, I just looked again before moving on to the next sentence. There's a little hogo here, more so than on the Privateer, but it fits here and gives the spirit more depth and complexity. I like this more than the Privateer. Also, I haven't had the pleasure of trying GT Stagg, so I can't say whether I'd take this over it. Having a bottle of the lesser Stagg Jr, I'd say that the quality and experience is fairly similar, although having limited experience with aged rum means that my palate is likely not as attuned to the nuances of the spirit as it might be for whiskey.