Name: Nopper's The Fat Duck
Call name: "Duke"
Date of Birth: January 21st, 2022
Coat Colour: Red & White
Height: 19.5 inches
Weight: 44 pounds
This is Duke, our dashingly deboniair Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever boy. He is the proud son of our girl DeeDee and our boy Slash. Duke is multi-generational raw fed and it shows!
Even from a wee age of (approximately) negative nine weeks, Duke and his sister Tea have been inseparable - right down to sharing a womb and then having back to back debuts. In short order, their personalities have blended into a perfect yin and yang. Where she is a mischievous free spirit with a dry (some would even say "British") sense of humour, The Duke is a confident, stylish, and charming rogue. One who remains relaxed and self-assured even under intense pressure - the pressure of his sister dragging him into her latest caper. Yes, he always gives in eventually and the resulting hijinks are a joy to watch. Which is exactly why we named them after two... 'iconic institutions' of culinary delight: Taco Bell and The Fat Duck.
Taco Bell is unabashedly boisterous, brightly lit, and the kind of place you visit at 11 p.m. On a whim. To order four things you didn't even know you wanted... and regret nothing. The Fat Duck is the exact opposite: three Michelin stars, a tasting menu measured in hours, with food choices including a snail porridge that has made grown critics weep. One is served in a paper sleeve; the other arrives under a cloche. Putting those two names in the same litter on two pups we were keeping was the punchline - and the magic deepens the moment you meet them, because the dogs have gleefully grown into their labels. The one named after drive-thru chaos is the free spirit; the one named after a temple of gastronomy is the smooth, self-possessed gentleman who has to be talked into the next caper... and there is always another caper.
Yes, the names are absurd. They suit them perfectly. That was rather the point... even if it probably says more about us than it does about them.
