Distillerie Depaz

On 8 May 1902 the eruption of Mont Pelee wiped Saint-Pierre off the map of Martinique. The Depaz family was among the dead - all but Victor, who was studying in Bordeaux at the time. He returned, walked the volcanic slopes that had killed his family, and decided to rebuild on the same ground. The new Distillerie Depaz opened on 8 May 1917, exactly fifteen years to the day after the eruption, fed by 521 hectares of cane planted on volcanic soil and pressed at the foot of the still-restless mountain.

The estate Victor rebuilt is still there. The Chateau Depaz, restored on the original family footprint, anchors a working AOC Martinique distillery that today farms around 80 hectares of cane on the volcanic flanks. Production is rhum agricole - distilled directly from fresh sugar cane juice, never molasses - under the AOC framework that governs every step from cane variety through ageing. The blue cane that Victor's family grew before 1902 is still pressed here. The working range covers the Depaz Blanc (the Ti'Punch and cocktail base), the Plantation Cuvee (a soft, accessible aged expression), the Hors d'Age (XO, the showcase bottling), and millesime single-vintage releases when allocations allow.

Drink the Blanc in a Ti'Punch or a Caribbean highball. The Plantation Cuvee reads cleanly over a single rock; the Hors d'Age is a neat sipper for after dinner. The 2002 vintage release is a particular collector's note - bottled exactly a century after the eruption. On the AOC Martinique shelf, Depaz reads structured and oak-forward against Saint James's grassier Atlantic style and J.M's experimental cask programme.