John­nie Walk­er Blue scent­ed Wild Mush­room Soup and John­nie Walk­er Blue Choco­late Delice are just two of the scotch-in­fused dish­es that top lo­cal chef Khalid Mo­hammed will serve to­day to dis­cern­ing guests on the lux­u­ry yacht, The John Walk­er & Sons Voy­ager.

The Voy­ager, which made an ap­pear­ance in the last James Bond movie Sky­fall, is docked at Pier 1, Ch­aguara­mas. It is in Trinidad as part of a world tour that in­clud­ed stops in Asia and Eu­rope. The vis­it has been or­gan­ised by glob­al drinks gi­ant Di­a­geo and its lo­cal agents Bry­dens. Be­tween to­day and to­mor­row, there will be three gala events at which the lux­u­ry brands in the John­nie Walk­er range of scotch whisky will be high­light­ed.

Mo­hammed, the chef pa­tron at Chaud restau­rant in Port-of-Spain, is no stranger to glam­orous events and has been fea­tured on cook­ing pro­grammes in the US and the UK. He is nonethe­less quite ex­cit­ed about the op­por­tu­ni­ty to be a part of this pres­ti­gious oc­ca­sion.

"I feel priv­i­leged that Bry­dens chose me," Mo­hammed said in an in­ter­view at his restau­rant.

"It's re­al­ly an ho­n­our that John­nie Walk­er want­ed me to be their lo­cal chef. I rate this oc­ca­sion quite high­ly.

Mo­hammed point­ed out some of the chal­lenges he faces, like a small gal­ley kitchen and hav­ing to use two kitchens which are far apart. A known per­fec­tion­ist, Mo­hammed's main con­cern is keep­ing the food at op­ti­mal tem­per­a­ture, but he's not fazed.

"The pres­sure is on to get it right. And I plan to de­liv­er a great mix of dish­es."

Asked if he's go­ing to fo­cus on lo­cal pro­duce, he said he in­tends to use the best lo­cal pro­duce where pos­si­ble.

One of the high­lights of the Voy­ager's vis­it is the launch of John Walk­er and Sons Odyssey, a new triple malt whisky. The Odyssey is a lim­it­ed edi­tion Scotch and on­ly 50 bot­tles will be avail­able in T&T. Whisky lovers who want to cap­ture a bot­tle of Odyssey will have to shell out US$1,000 or $6,400 vat in­clu­sive.

Di­a­geo's glob­al am­bas­sador Glaswe­gian Tom Jones is al­so here to speak about the whiskies in the John­nie Walk­er range. He should feel right at home in Trinidad as he told the T&T Guardian in a re­cent in­ter­view that he en­joys his Scotch best with co­conut wa­ter, clear­ly some­thing a lot of Tri­nis can re­late to.

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