9 minute read
LIQUOR
LIQUOR Dalmore No. 6 whisky is worth dreaming about by Mike Usinger
Assuming your name isn’t Jimmy Pattison, Jeff Bezos, or the newly liberated Elon Musk, the beginning of this week’s Liquor Nerd isn’t for bottles and into marketing materials before marketing was even a thing.” While most distillers were busy making whisky in their washtubs in the mid-1800s, you. That doesn’t mean you can’t dream.
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And as anyone who has ever wasted five bucks on the tax on the stupid known as a lottery ticket knows, sometimes dreaming can be enough. Who hasn’t purchased a Lotto Max ticket after the jackpot has climbed to $70 million and then started mentally spending the money. A house on the beach in Tofino, complete with floor-to-ceiling glass for storm-watching season. A robin’s egg blue ’57 Chevy, a Vanishing Point-white Dodge Challenger R/T, and Smokey and the Bandit black Trans Am, complete with the gold eagle on the hood. And sashimi-grade seafood for dinner every night of the week, not just when it’s on sale at T & T—hello fresh B.C. Dungeness crab and flash-frozen Nova Scotia sea scallops.
And let’s not forget the Dalmore Decades No. 6 Collection, which, conveniently, is about to go up for auction on October 8 in Shanghai, China. The expected price for six bottles, each representing a decade starting in 1951 and ending in 2000?
“We’re hoping that it’s going to be the highest at auction yet on record,” says Dalmore spokesman Louis-Jérôme Doise, interviewed by the Straight at the Fairmont Pacific in Coal Harbour. “The estimate is $500,000 US dollars.” Which is to say a mere fraction of your upcoming Lotto Max win. And money well spent from a collector’s point of view: there is only one Dalmore Decades No. 6 Collection in the world. Should that be a little too rich for even you, the options for the deservedly fabled Scotch whisky don’t stop there. In the coming months 15 five-bottle collections of Dalmore will be put up for retail sale around the world, including stores in Beverly Hills, the U.K., and France. The No. 5 Collection will likely run somewhere around $340,000 in Canadian currency. Dalmore is also making 25 sets of fourbottles available around the world. Six will be held back at the distillery in Scotland, meaning there are only 19 to get your hands on around the planet. One of those Dalmore No. 4 sets, comprised of whiskies from ’79, ’80, ’95, and 2000, will land in Vancouver. “We were lucky to get one for Canada,” Doise says. “The collector’s world in Vancouver is really quite unique—there’s a higher draw to these high-end collectible whiskies in Vancouver than there is in say Montreal or Toronto.” At the end of October BC Liquor stores will open an online draw for the Dalmore No. 4 collection, where the winner will pony up around $172,000 for the set. The official story of the Dalmore distillery with the famous stag logo goes back not just decades, but in fact centuries, to 1839. And, unofficially, even further back to a time when whisky production was like something from a U.K. version of the wild west. “A major pillar of our DNA is our royal heritage,” Doise notes of the Dalmore story. “Although we were founded in 1839 by a fellow named Alexander Matheson, the claim to fame of our stag logo and our royal heritage dates back to 1367.” The Coles Notes version is that King Alexander the Third of Scotland was out on a hunting party with Colin of Kintail of the Mackenzie Clan. “Out of nowhere came a raging stag,” Doise relates. “Colin killed the stag which was heading right for the King. Out of gratitude the King gave the Mackenzie clan the right to use a 12-pointed stag. The Mackenzies came into the picture at Dalmore in the 1860s, and put their family crest and emblem on the Dalmore was already serious about the business. “It was around the 1860s that we rolled out our first 12-year-old age statement,” Doise says. “Back in those days, no one was really doing age statements at all. It was still about bootlegging because it was illegal to produce whisky. That really shows that, early on, we were putting quality, time, and effort into the scotches that we were producing.” Over the past 180 years Dalmore has had just five master distilleries, including Richard Paterson who retired after a 50-year run in 2020. (The No. 6, No. 5, and No. 4 bottle collections hitting the market in the coming months are partially inspired by his legacy.) The big question for recent Lotto Max winners new to the collectible whisky game is what they’re getting. Given the price tag, an obvious one is quality. If you’ve ever tasted even a 30-year-old whisky then you’re well aware it comes from a different place than what most of us buy at the liquor store, even for special occasions. “One of the goals and tasks of Richard, and his predecessors, was travelling the world and finding some of the best casks in which to lay these spirits to rest,” Doise relates. “The casks we use accentuate and develop the spirits. When you’re talking whisky production, it’s not ‘You put it in a cask and let it sit for 25 years.’ You need to nurture the whisky. Sometimes you play with whisky by putting it into sherry casks, and then port pipes and maybe even a red wine casks.” Whoever walks away with the coveted Dalmore Decades No. 6 set will contribute to the pursuit of excellence in another way. Fifteen percent of the auction sale will go to the Scottish design museum V&A Dundee which Dalmore has had an ongoing relationship with. “Some brands are partnering with luxury cars,” Doise observes. “In our case we’re with the only design museum in Scotland in Dundee. This is a multi-year collaboration where we’ll be creating and ideating on ‘What is the future of luxury? What is the future of design? And how do those integrate into each other’s worlds?’ It goes far beyond the packaging. It’s about the steps of time, about mastery and vision.” For those who’ve yet to cash in a winning ticket, Dalmore also has options that included the brand’s Sherry Cask Select 12 Year Old ($119 at B.C. Liquor stores), and a 12 Year Old that punches in at $99.99. But remember that there’s also nothing wrong with daring to dream. This week’s Lotto Max jackpot sits at $70 million. And you’ve got a week and a bit before the Dalmore auction in Shanghai. Good luck. g
Dalmore Decades No. 6 Collection is expected to fetch US$500,000 at auction on October 8.
FOOD Unvaxxed activists protest near local restaurants
by Charlie Smith
Now that the federal election is out of the way, hardcore opponents of vaccine passports have set their sights on food and beverage establishments in Metro Vancouver.
They’re doing this despite B.C. government officials pointing out that bars and eateries are required under a provincial health order to verify that patrons have been vaccinated. Without this verification through the B.C. Vaccine Card program, customers aren’t permitted on the premises of these businesses.
On September 24, the “We Are All Essential” Facebook page featured a video of one of these activists, Samantha H. Flatman, marching with about 50 other vaccine-passport opponents down Robson Street.
“What we are going to do is check to see if restaurants are enforcing the passports,” Flatman said in the video. “And if they are, we’re going to break off in twos and sit in front of the restaurants with our signs and really make a public demonstration.”
Among the targeted restaurants included a Jugo Juice outlet on West Georgia Street, Cactus Club on Robson Street, Joe Fortes Seafood & Chop House on Thurlow Street, and Earls Restaurant on Hornby Street, where one of the demonstrators was arrested.
As police subdued the man, another male protester is heard on video shouting outside the front door. “Welcome to Nazi Germany,” the protester declared. “This is segregation. Great job, brother.”
On September 25, Coast Restaurant on Alberni Street was targeted.
In the September 24 video, Flatman claimed that the B.C. Vaccine Card program has never been about protecting people’s health.
“It’s been about control,” she insisted. “And this is their coercion tactic to get more people to take the shot because they don’t want to lose their ability to go to restaurants with friends or to go to concerts or sporting events, et cetera.
“But this is a slippery slope,” Flatman continued. “This is now a two-tiered society and we cannot allow for that, right?”
At that point, she turned her camera behind her. One of the protesters called on the others to march to Yaletown, where there are more restaurants. Flatman then replied that “further down to Denman, there are lots of restaurants”.
There are signs that these roving crowds of protesters will be targeting small businesses in other cities. Another of the activists, Ryan Kulbaba, posted a message on social media saying “a local pub here in the Surrey / Clayton Heights area that needs education on our BC HR Code!!!!! They only allow jibjabbers.”
Kulbaba added that he needed about 20 or 30 people to join him to visit this pub. “The sooner the date the better,” he stated. “We cannot wait any longer.”
These tactics reflect a three-pronged strategy announced by one of Canada’s most famous antivaxxers, Chris Sky, at a rally at Sunset Beach on April 20. At that time, he urged people in the audience to confront and harass frontline retail workers, defy public-health orders, and block anti-COVID measures in schools.
One B.C. opponent of vaccine passports, Marco Pietro, has been a vocal critic of Sky, a.k.a. Chris Soccoccia. Over social media, Pietro condemned recent tactics targeting workers as “inciting violence against innocent people”, “reprehensible”, “abhorrent”, “ignorant”, “harmful”, “unproductive”, “destructive”, and “beyond disgusting”.
On September 27, B.C.’s provincial health officer, Dr. Bonnie Henry, announced that there were 2,239 new COVID-19 cases over the previous three-day period. There were an additional 18 COVID-related deaths over the same time span. More than 300 people are in hospitals in B.C. with COVID-19. g
Antivaccine-passport activists have decided to picket restaurants. Photo by Janet McDonald.
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