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FRANKLY SPEAKING by Frank Legato
Bottoms Up
64
Global Gaming Business JANUARY 2022
booze is even more expensive than Grey Goose. It’s made with Charles Heidsieck Champagne Charlie 1981 and Louis XIII de Remy Martin Black Pearl cognac. Plus, a pair of silver cufflinks and an 18-karat white-gold chain. Are you sensing a pattern here? The Ono Cocktail costs about $1,000 a sip. Even more if you add Ono sideboards and spinal crackers. But maybe they weren’t referencing Yoko Ono at all with that drink. Maybe they meant you look at the bill and go, “Oh, no!” In either case, what you’ve got here is a nice high-end drink with jewelry in it. Doesn’t that affect the taste? Isn’t there a danger you’ll swallow a silver cufflink? The other casino to make the Top 5 on the Payday Loans List of Ridiculously Expensive Cocktails was Foxwoods Resort in Connecticut, where you can pony up to the bar in the new Mezz Ultra Lounge and order a Sapphire Martini, No. 4 on the most-pricey-drink list. Served in a traditional martini glass, the Sapphire Martini is made with Blue Curacao, Bombay Sapphire Gin and a splash of dry vermouth, and is coated with blue sugar on the rim. “But,” as the Danbury, Connecticut News-Times reports, “it’s the accompanying pair of custom-made blue sapphire and diamond earrings, set in a sterling silver pick, that makes the cocktail sweet.” Well, at least it’s on the side instead of in the drink. If the first young clubber who ordered the drink was handed the bar tab while taking a sip, I’m guessing he did a Danny Thomas-style “spit-take.” Not really. Evidently, this is the next big thing for the clubber generation. “I think people are willing to spend more to have a premium experience, so they’re buying less but they’re buying higher quality,” said Brett Anderson, senior vice president and editorial director for luxury lifestyle magazine The Robb Report, in remarks to the News-Times. Anderson called uber-expensive drinks “a Louis Vuitton bag for the bar crowd.” Sooo... how about some Pappy Van Winkle bourbon in a Louis Vuitton bag? On my budget, it’s going to be Jim Beam and a Timex watch. At least the watch will keep on ticking. VICT OR R INALDO
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here’s good news for connoisseurs of high-end cocktails at Las Vegas casinos. Or Las Vegas resort guests who want to pay outrageous prices for drinks simply because they can afford it and want all of us hoi-polloi to know it. Two Las Vegas resorts made the Top 5 in the Payday Loans Net list of the most expensive cocktails in the world. Yes, those are the people who will front you a loan until payday up to the amount of whatever collateral you have, such as a deed to a car, or a kidney. Naturally, the people who give out payday loans are the best to appreciate the nuances of the world’s finest cocktails. I’m sure they deal with cocktail snobs all the time. “Do you think my pickup is worth enough for a rare Remy Martin cognac? I just changed the oil.” In any event, the cocktail that won Payday Loans recognition as the most expensive cocktail in the world wasn’t from a casino, but it was a fancy hotel, part of our overall hospitality industry. The winner was the “Diamonds Are Forever” cocktail at the Ritz Carlton in Tokyo, which you can have the bartender slide your way for a mere $22,600. According to a news report, the Diamonds Are Forever drink contains Grey Goose vodka, a twist of lime, and a $16,000 diamond. Hold the phone here. Is Payday Loans’ idea of creating a fine cocktail taking a bottle off the shelf, pouring booze into a glass and dropping in a slice of lime, plus an expensive jewel? The Mad Diamond. It’s created with a $10,000 diamond placed in a tumbler of Mad Dog 20/20. Ruby of the South. A ruby immersed in a bottle of Southern Comfort. Diamond-Imp-and-Arn. A shot of Imperial whiskey and an Iron City Beer with a diamond chaser. (That’s for my Pittsburgh buds.) However, this isn’t quite the same. If you look more closely at the most expensive cocktail in the world, it’s a $16,000 diamond in a $22,600 drink. That means they’re charging $6,600 for a slice of lime and a couple ounces of Grey Goose vodka. OK, that’s preposterous enough to appeal to wealthy drinkers. The second-most expensive drink in the world can be found in our very own casino universe, at the XS Nightclub in Wynn Las Vegas. It’s the Ono Cocktail, priced at $10,000. This one’s a real bargain, because the
