You won’t find this $7,500 tequila in a jumbo house margarita

Get a salt shaker and slice of lime ready, because this news might be a bit hard to swallow: There’s a $7,500 bottle of tequila.

You read that right. Patron tequila and French glassmaker Lalique have partnered to create Patron en Lalique: Série 2. The tequila has been aged for eight years in a combination of American oak, French oak and sherry barrels. The resulting liquor is sold in individually blown, signed decanters with handcrafted crystal bee-shaped stoppers. It also comes with a fancy wooden box.

It’s the second in such a series – hence the Série 2. Five hundred bottles of Série 1 were released two years ago and Patron is selling what’s left of that limited edition for $7,725 a bottle.

That comes to more than $435 a shot depending on which Série you buy and how generous you are with pouring a 1.5-ounce imperial shot. Of course, you can use the decanter again – perhaps fill it with Sauza Gold and see if your tequila aficionado friends notice.

While Série 1 and 2 can be ordered on Patron’s website in some states, residents of Kansas and Missouri will have to order the bottles through a liquor store or distributor. So far, very few tequila lovers in the Kansas City area – if any – seem to be clamoring for the limited edition bottles of agave booze.

Ranjit Singh, manager at Grand Liquor in Mission, said he checked with his distributor, Southern Glazers, and they hadn’t had any requests for it this year or in previous years.

“I doubt people in the Midwest are buying that much. Maybe people on the coasts,” said Singh, noting that the most expensive bottle of liquor he’s ever sold was a 25-year-old Glenlivet single-malt scotch for about $500.

Carly Jones, manager at Rimann Liquors in Prairie Village, has heard of Patron En Lalique tequila but hasn’t had any requests for it either.

The most expensive bottle of liquor sold in her store, she says, was a $3,500 bottle of Remy Martin XIII cognac. It also comes in a special mouth-blown decanter, which was designed after a 16th-century metal flask discovered on the site of the Battle of Jarnac.

“Some people come in and don’t care what the dollar amount is,” Jones says. “They just want something nice. If people are looking for something that special, they’ll pay top dollar. We have to order it and then the driver has to keep it buckled in the passenger seat. I’m serious, they don’t put it in the back of the truck with the rest of the merchandise.”

Patron recommends drinking it “neat in a tequila flute or snifter to truly appreciate the nuances of this extremely rare aged tequila.”

We suggest you sip – rather than taking a shot – in order to get your money’s worth.

This story was originally published November 3, 2017 at 5:45 PM with the headline "You won’t find this $7,500 tequila in a jumbo house margarita."