MISANTHROPIA: The Sourtoe Cocktail

Champagne seasoned with an amputated toe

Established in 1973, the Sourtoe Cocktail has become a Dawson City tradition, and is exactly what is sounds like: An actual human toe that has been dehydrated, preserved in salt, and served in a drink.

According to the story, Yukon local Captain Dick Stevenson found the toe preserved in the jar of alcohol while cleaning a cabin in 1973. After discussing it with friends, Captain Dick preserved and started serving the toe in a "Sourtoe Cocktail" at the Eldorado hotel bar.

The first toe is said to have belonged to a miner and rum runner named Louie Liken, who had his frostbitten appendage amputated in the 1920s. Likens preserved it in a a jar of alcohol in his cabin, until Captain Dick Stevenson found it some 50 years later.

Unfortunately the first toe only lasted for seven more years after that. According to the Sourtoe Cocktail Club, "In July 1980, a miner named Garry Younger was trying for the Sourtoe record. On his thirteenth glass of Sourtoe champagne his chair tipped over backwards and he swallowed the toe. Sadly, Toe #1 was not recovered."

Since then seven more toes have been donated to the bar. Number two was given after an amputation due to an inoperable corn, number three was from a victim frostbite (it was also swallowed accidentally), four was an anonymous toe (stolen by a hunter), toes five and six were donated by a Yukon old-timer in return for free drinks for his nurses, toe seven was an amputation due to diabetes and toe eight arrived in a jar of alcohol with the message "Don't wear open toed sandals while mowing the lawn."

The original rules were that the toe must be placed in a beer glass full of champagne, and that the toe must touch the drinker's lips during the consumption of the alcohol before he or she can claim to be a true Sourtoer.

The rules have changed in the past 27 years. The Sourtoe can now be had with any drink now, but one rule remains the same: "You can drink it fast, you can drink it slow -- But the lips have gotta touch the toe."