Relish

Any baseball card collector can tell you that in the last 20 years, the “insert” has turned the hobby upside-down. Inserts are cards that are short-packed for rarity, and feature autographs or swatches of game-used uniforms embedded in the card. They have proven so desirable that collectors routinely shun the “common” cards, i.e., anything that is not an insert.

Some say that the insert ruined the hobby, but if you have collecting fever, you’re too busy chasing after rarities to stop and philosophize.

So it goes with liquor, too, it turns out. Rare beers and bourbons are like autographed ballcards to sophisticated boozehounds. The modern, refined drinker pursues his quarry through a thicket of raffles, wait lists, and Tweeted announcements about the New Rare Bottle That You Must Own. Every week, it seems, something exclusive and pricy is released in a hush-hush manner. If you’re in the cult, though, you feel the anxiety. Will I get to try it? If I don’t win the raffle, what will I do? Is there a way I can become friendly with the guy who does win the raffle? Hmm…

Now, into this land of exclusive sippin’ comes a bourbon extraordinarily rare and odd even by the usual standards. This Friday, the Wine & Cheese Place family of shops will hold a raffle for the right to buy the only bottle of Jefferson’s Ocean bourbon that this city will see.

This is a bourbon made by Jefferson’s, a “very small batch” Kentucky distillery that normally only makes eight to 12 barrels of each of its four labels. Jefferson’s Ocean, though, takes it a step further – this is bourbon that has been aged in the hold of a ship that sailed for 10,000 nautical miles over three and half years (that's Jefferson's owner Trey Zoeller at right, atop barrels of Ocean).

The resulting bourbon sloshed and sloshed in its barrels, acquiring the kind of mahogany-dark hue that makes whiskey fiends salivate.

There are only 246 bottles of Ocean available. (Some of the barrels corroded and were rendered undrinkable, according to this article in the New York Times.)

Locally, the Wine & Cheese Place sells more Jefferson’s than any other retailer, explained Paul Hayden, the manager of the chain’s Forsyth shop. That’s why they will be receiving the single bottle of Jefferson’s Ocean that this burg will bear witness to.

How on earth do you decide to whom to sell a liquor so rare that an entire town of bourbon fanciers would kill for it, but there is just a single bottle to be had?

You raffle it off, using the rules that the Wine & Cheese Place has put forth.

And we quote:

• There is only 1 bottle available to purchase. 
• Sign up now through Thursday, October 18, 7 p.m.
• Drawing will be held on Friday, October 19 (you do not have to be present.) 
• If your name is drawn, you can purchase the bottle for $199.99 plus tax
• No phone entries
• No purchase necessary (each person can sign up once without any purchase)
• You get an additional sign up for each bottle of Jefferson’s product you purchase (any style). 
• You must be 21 to enter
• You can sign up at any of our 4 locations

Note that you get an extra ticket in the raffle for every bottle of Jefferson’s you purchase. That’s the sort of tip that a strategist will consider. Note also the $200 price. Um, whoa.

Local blogger Pat “Bourbon & Banter” Garrett has tried the Ocean, and reports that it’s a complex delicacy, best enjoyed by seasoned bourbon drinkers.

If that describes you, and you don’t win the raffle, don’t fret. Hayden can tell you about a dozen other raffles coming up soon, where hardcore liquor aficionados of one stripe or another will compete for other rarities.

“In three weeks or so we’ll raffle off the Pappy Van Winkle bourbons,” he said. “None of those will ever see the shelf.”

“But,” he explained, “the most common raffles we do are for beer.”

The Wine and Cheese Place has created a symbiotic relationship between beer and bourbon, by which unusual and rare beers are aged in barrels that once held exotic bourbons. Local brewers like 4 Hands, Six Row, and Perennial Artisan Ales are all involved.

For instance, right now some of Perennial’s sweet Fantastic Voyage coconut stout is being aged in bourbon barrels to add another shade of flavor. In two weeks, Hayden said, the Wine & Cheese Place will sell bottles of Six Row’s 10-malt, bitter Killer Whale beer that’s been aged in barrels of Buffalo Trace bourbon. (It will be called “Killer Buffalo.”) A wild ménage à trois between Jefferson’s 18-year-old bourbon, a sweet-potato beer by 4 Hands, and real, organic Vermont maple syrup resulted in maple-bourbon-sweet potato beer, and bourbon-aged maple syrup. Hayden said the latter is great on both pancakes and salmon. It sounds like Willy Wonka opened a bar.

The Wine & Cheese Shop has done about five of these bourbon/beer in-barrel experiments in the last year, said Hayden, with some 15 more on the way. They are lustily popular.

“We have 400 to 500 people on some of our waiting lists,” he said. “One of the things that really kicks up the demand is Twitter and Facebook, of course.”

“The Buffalo Trace Antique Collection of bourbons came out two weeks ago,” Hayden said. “We sent out a link, announced that it was first-come first-serve, and it sold out in 90 seconds. People are amazed by how fast you have to be to get some of this stuff.”