Dual Dial

It is not uncommon for a debut puzzle box to be a follow up feature here on B&B. Sometimes a new designer doesn’t make it onto the radar for a while (despite my passion for finding new talent!), sometimes the success of subsequent productions merits a return to the past, and sometimes (more often than I’ll admit publicly) a new designer sends me to the back of queue with the rest of the rabble rousers (appropriately!), promotions be damned. Which usually means they don’t need my help anyway!

Dual Dial puzzle by Kyle Chester — dial prep
*photo courtesy of Kyle Chester*

So I waited patiently for my turn to try Kyle Chester’s original puzzle box from his fledgling company, Potentially Perplexing Puzzles, the Dual Dial. In the meantime, I had the pleasure of pondering his follow up puzzle, the 3P Box, which as mentioned in that brilliant offering was almost named “Single Dial” for fairly obvious reasons. Kyle designs the puzzles, and his grandfather Steven crafts them in his workshop using old school techniques. The results are very nicely made, enjoyable conundrums. They don’t currently have a website so tracking them down can be a perplexing puzzle too.

Kyle told me a bit about the origins of the Dual Dial, which came about as his gift for a popular international holiday puzzle exchange (we have seen quite a number of phenomenal puzzles created for this event over the years). “I started designing this puzzle last summer whilst on a 4 hour flight for work. I sketched up the initial idea, and as it was my first puzzle, I designed it with some quite unrealistic design choices. I quickly learned what was/wasn’t possible and the design changed a lot on paper before we started making the box.

The first prototype was rustic, rough and huge at almost double the size we have now. I don’t have the exact measurements but from the images you can see what it was and then what it evolved into. After much trial and error (certainly with the side panel, that took so many revisions to get it right) we had a functioning thing, and it had arrived in our laps just in time for me to gift the puzzle to another puzzler for the mechanical puzzle discord Secret Santa. I popped in a prized coin with a Christmas-y image on it to make it fit the Secret Santa theme, and off it went.

At this point I didn’t know if this would be the only puzzle I’d ever make, and I was very proud that we’d produced something tangible, that worked reliably and was (hopefully) fun to do.” Kyle had a number of inquiries about the puzzle box at that point, and decided he would produce enough to satisfy the growing demand. Having experienced the puzzle box now, I can see why – it’s quite fun and has a few well executed sequential discovery steps to reach the goal, which turns out to be unusual!

“I wanted Dual Dial to have a nice prize, the original version had a Christmas coin in it, but when I started making more I thought it would be cool to mention a need to ‘find your numbers’ and have people expect to find a serial number or edition number of the puzzle, and then to have a nice little surprise of [well you will just have to solve the puzzle box to find out]!

That was December 2022, and since then myself and my grandfather, Steven, have gone on to make roughly 50 copies of the puzzle. We’ve not decided on a definitive end point on when we will stop producing them, but I can’t wait to move onto more ideas.” The pair of puzzle makers have already started producing their next box, the 3P, and have plans for other ideas as well. I’m certainly looking forward to the follow up to this follow up myself.

I’m toasting the Dual Dial with a “duo” drink that’s perfect for the autumn vibes we have happening here in the northern hemisphere of the world. A duo cocktail is really any drink with two ingredients, a simple formula which can take on many forms. Most often this is found as a base spirit with a modifier, such as a rye whiskey with sweet vermouth, a drink more commonly known as a Manhattan. Well known duos include the Rusty Nail (scotch and Drambuie), the Godfather (scotch and amaretto) and the martini (gin and dry vermouth). Duos are so easy to make (and thus so popular). The modifier doesn’t even need to be another spirit. Cuba Libre anyone? (That’s a rum and coke.)

As luck would have it, when I was puzzling over this duo dialed box, a chilled refreshing beer was calling my name. So in the spirit of the duality I added a shot of bitter orange liqueur to the glass, in the time honored tradition of French outdoor cafes everywhere … in France. Amer Picon is a wonderfully complex bitter liqueur, a French amaro created in 1837 as a medicinal tonic to make the antimalarial quinine more (?) palatable – a familiar story among bitters. Picon found its way into a few notable cocktails, such as the “Brooklyn”, but is no longer imported to America and thus has become a bit obscure here. Which is a terrible shame, because we are (mostly) missing out on one of the best ways to enjoy this spirit, which is to add it to a crisp light beer. The recommended types are pilsner or Kolsch, but I find it adds layers to almost any beer and have experimented with plenty. Pick up a bottle in Paris next time you stop through – your beer will thank you. Cheers!

Dual Dial puzzle by Kyle Chester and Picon Biere — seeing double

Picon Bière

¾ - 1 oz Amer Picon

6 oz chilled beer

Build ingredients over ice in a tall glass. Orange wheel garnish traditional.

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Dual Dial

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