The Pour
Columnist · Monthly · First Sunday

The Collector

Rare bottles, cellars, auctions, provenance.

Islay opinions that have cost friendships. Reads auction catalogues like novels. Files what to buy, hold, and eventually open.

Voice: Weighty, patient, faintly Scottish.

Single maltCellared beerAuction picksCask strength
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Recent filings · 6

Tokyo, Japan

300 Japanese whiskies. Silent films on the wall.

Zoetrope
Seattle, WA

Capitol Hill. The country's deepest back bar. Bring your reading glasses.

Canon
Portland, OR

Downtown. Two floors of back bar. Membership optional. Reverence required.

Multnomah Whiskey Library
Los Angeles, CA

American whiskey, a rotating R&D bar, and a band in the back.

Harvard & Stone
Chicago, IL

The amaro shelf is a library, and they'll let you read it.

Billy Sunday
London, UK

Aperitifs upstairs, whisky and jazz downstairs.

Swift

Picks

Bottles
  • Yamazaki 12
    Suntory · Osaka, Japan

    The gateway Japanese single malt, now hard to find at MSRP. Mizunara softness, honey, a whisper of incense.

  • Orval
    Brasserie d'Orval · Belgium

    Trappist ale that changes character month to month in the cellar. Age it. Argue about it.

  • Valpolicella Classico Superiore
    Giuseppe Quintarelli · Veneto, Italy

    Cellar bottle. Sweet dried fruit stretched over serious structure.

  • Chaillot Cornas
    Thierry Allemand · Rhône, France

    Northern Syrah at full seriousness. Olive, blood, violets.

  • Viña Tondonia Blanco Reserva
    R. López de Heredia · Rioja, Spain

    Oxidative white aged a decade before release. There is nothing else like it.

  • Monte Bello
    Ridge Vineyards · Santa Cruz Mtns., California

    The bottle that beat Bordeaux twice. Buy it, forget it, open it in a decade.

  • Nicolás Catena Zapata
    Catena Zapata · Mendoza, Argentina

    High-altitude Malbec with a Cabernet spine. Built for the grill.

  • Diana Madeline
    Cullen Wines · Margaret River, Australia

    Biodynamic Cabernet with gravel and restraint. Australia's quiet great.

  • Springbank 15
    Springbank · Campbeltown, Scotland

    Sherry, brine, oil. The distillery that does every step on site.

  • Lagavulin 16
    Lagavulin · Islay, Scotland

    The peat benchmark. Smoke, iodine, and a finish that outlasts the conversation.

  • Clynelish 14
    Clynelish · Highlands, Scotland

    Waxy, citric, weirdly textural. The bartender's malt.

  • From the Barrel
    Nikka · Japan

    51.4% in a 500ml brick. The best value in whisky, full stop.

  • Single Barrel
    Four Roses · Kentucky, USA

    High-rye, cask-strength-adjacent, built for an Old Fashioned.

  • Redbreast 12
    Midleton · Ireland

    Single pot still: oily, orchard-fruited, endlessly forgiving.

  • Bas-Armagnac 25 Year
    Delord · Gascony, France

    Rustic where Cognac is polished. The correct end to a long dinner.

  • VSOP Grande Champagne
    Paul Beau · Cognac, France

    Unsugared, unboisé Cognac. Floral, dry, honest.

  • Classic Gueuze
    Cantillon · Brussels, Belgium

    Spontaneous fermentation, three years of blending. Acid that resets a palate.

  • Oude Kriek
    3 Fonteinen · Beersel, Belgium

    Whole cherries in lambic. Dry, tart, deadly serious.

  • Pilsener
    Jever · Friesland, Germany

    Punishingly bitter North German pils. The correct beer with fried anything.

  • Palatine Pils
    Suarez Family Brewery · Hudson Valley, NY

    American brewers finally taking lager as seriously as the Czechs do.

Cocktails
  • Japanese Highball
    1.5oz whisky · hard ice · chilled soda · one stir

    Technique disguised as simplicity. Cold glass, cold soda, minimal agitation.