private stock

plural private stocks

1. uncountableusuallyset phraseA supply of something, especially alcoholic beverages, belonging to a person or a commercial establishment and of such quality that it is usually reserved for the owner or for favoured friends or customers.

   2004, Robert Priest, How to Swallow a Pig, →ISBN, (Google preivew)" Then he takes out a bottle of his own private stock, finds himself a flower or some butterflies, and proceeds to get very drunk.

   5 more examples

   [T]o feed 126 souls, we had but . . . Three ham-sandwiches, and a pot of currant-jelly, and 197 bottles of brandy, rum, madeira, pale ale (my private stock) . . .

   1869, William Makepeace Thackeray, chapter 6, in Burlesques

   The refreshment was brought in, and before the session adjourned, they had lowered the contents of a black bottle of private stock by several fingers.

   1906, Andy Adams, “Seigerman's Per Cent”, in Cattle Brands

   "And after all I've done for her," said Mr. Reginald Cracknell, his voice tremulous with self-pity and his eyes moist with the combined effects of anguish and over-indulgence in his celebrated private stock, "after all I've done for her she throws me down."

   1912, P. G. Wodehouse, chapter 16, in The Adventures of Sally

   And it is heartening to be able to find a good and heady mutton chop to accompany a club member's claret from his private stock.

   1989 March 12, Christopher Idone, “Food: Club Comfort”, in New York Times, retrieved 21 Jan 2014

   Booker employed his private stock as a late afternoon delight for visitors to the Boston distillery.

   2011, F. Paul Pacult, American Still Life: The Jim Beam Story and the Making of the World's #1 Bourbon, →ISBN