JM Rum AOC Agricole 1996 41.4% 700ml

Rhum J.M is the Distillerie Saint-Étienne's rum brand, made at the Macouba estate on Martinique's far northern tip — pressed against the volcanic flank of Mont Pelée and surrounded on three sides by the Atlantic. The estate has been making cane-juice rhum continuously since the late 1700s; Jean-Marie Martin gave the brand its initials in 1845 when he took over the operation.

The Macouba estate sits at higher altitude than most Martinique cane fields and gets more rainfall than the Atlantic-coast plains. Cane is cut and pressed within an hour of harvest; fermentation runs in concrete vats; distillation is in single-column copper Creole stills (the AOC Martinique standard). The house has a particularly long single-cask programme — the Atelier range puts cane from individual parcels through extended ageing in cask types that range from new oak to ex-Cognac to ex-Sauternes — and the Canopée is one of the few rhum agricole expressions specifically designed for cocktail work at high proof.

Bouchon stocks the working agricole range plus the Atelier and Canopée experimental series — 12 active SKUs across vintage millésimes (2006, 2011), the AOC-strength agricole programme, and the cask-finishing Atelier line. For trade buyers on the AOC Martinique shelf, J.M sits between Saint James (grassier, Atlantic-aromatic) and Depaz (volcanic-structured) — the third corner of the Martinique triangle, with the most experimental cask programme of the three.