What’s the perfect gift for a wine-loving Dad? Not wine, in my opinion, but rather a really great bottle of a distilled spirit.
Here’s my rationale: A really great gift is lasting, surprising, and not already possessed in abundance by the recipient, but wine given to a
wine lover is very unlikely to fit this bill in all three respects. If your father doesn’t have a wine cellar, your gift can’t be a lasting one, since the bottle shouldn’t be held for long and ought to be drained the night it is opened. If he does have a cellar, your gift of wine could be lasting, but then it would be just one more bottle added to a pile, and probably not much of a surprise.
By contrast, high-end spirits make terrific gifts for wine lovers. I can’t recall meeting one who didn’t appreciate excellent brandies and whiskeys. Yet, wine lovers tend to accumulate wine rather than distillates, and often don’t have more than a bottle or two of premium spirits in their home. Your gift should also prove lasting, since fine spirits are consumed a few sips at a time, and can be re-corked indefinitely. Finally, your present will come as a surprise, since wine 
lovers assume that a bottle-shaped package contains wine just as surely as a thin box is presumed to hold a necktie.
The catch is that this whole idea only works if your budget will permit you to buy something special–meaning pretty expensive and relatively rare. Standard-issue spirits actually make pretty lousy presents, since a $20 Scotch poured at every corner bar will just look like a bottle of booze bought on the fly by someone who didn’t want to spend much energy on gift selection. If you are going to give spirits as a present,
you need to either go high-end or go back to square one.
There are lots of great choices at your disposal, but a recent release that gets my enthusiastic endorsement is Glenrothes Vintage 1994 ($80), a terrific Speyside Scotch that is so soft and sweetly fruity that it could make a convert of your father even if he hasn’t been a Scotch drinker in the past. Intensely peaty Scotches like Laphroaig or Lagavulin are amazing whiskeys but very risky presents because they are almost shocking in their intensity. By contrast, this soft, almost sweet-seeming Glenrothes is very complex and interesting but not at all challenging. And when it comes to Father’s Day, any challenges involved with a gift should fall to you–not your father.
1