Mezcal
Flying
back from Oaxaca to Boston, my seatmates voiced commonly
held myths about mezcal and its infamous worm. Some
misconceptions stem from false associations with mescaline
and drug culture. mezcal, like tequila, makes you giddy and
happy, not depressed and anti-social. The worm absorbs
poisons and toxins. The worm is an aphrodisiac. I was happy
to share many facts about mezcal – a blossoming category
ready to ride into Dodge on the coattails of the ongoing
tequila craze.
MEZCAL
versus TEQUILA
Mezcal is tequila’s daddy. All tequila is mezcal, but not
all mezcal is tequila. Mezcal has been made by indigenous
Mexican peoples in and around Oaxaca since before the
arrival of the Spaniards. By contrast, tequila is a newbie:
distillers in Jalisco State (originally in the town of
tequila) invented it in the 195Os, largely for marketing
purposes, to distinguish it from mezcal and other agave
distillates.
All tequila and
mezcal is made from cooking, shredding and distilling the
subterranean base of various agave (Spanish, maguey) plants.
Agaves are large, low-lying multi-foil succulent semi-arid
plants that take 6 to 2O years to mature, then gradually die
over the course of a year. Plants used for reproduction are
allowed to shoot a tall flowering stalk and disseminate
seeds. Plants harvested for distillation have their stalk
cut, which leaves the juices to accumulate and concentrate
their starches, which create more sugar once the base is
cooked. The base (or pina, because of its similarity to a
large pineapple) is subjected to labor-intensive processing
and the prominent leaves are discarded or used for
compost.
RAW
MATERIALS Only the
blue agave (tequilana weber) plant can be used in the
production of tequila. mezcal is traditionally made from a
blend of up to 18 different agaves, some of them rare, wild
and local. The 1 inch worm in some mezcals is actually the
larva of a butterfly that invades agave plants and has long
been a prized food source. The worm, not added to tequila,
gives mezcal flavor and a slightly waxy texture. Both
tequila and mezcal may use caramel coloring for gold
versions; none is used in the aged distillates. Aging for
tequila and mezcal is similar: aging in oak barrels before
bottling, 12 months for reposados, 1 to 2 years for most
añejos.
CATEGORIES
Category I Mezcal, by the Denominacion de Origen law, must
be made with 1OO% agave (many varietals qualify). Very
little mezcal is Category I. Category II Mezcal must be made
from a minimum of 8O% agave and a maximum of 2O% other
sugars, and must be bottled at the source in
Mexico.
Tequila is
produced in three categories. As the world’s skyrocketing
demand for tequila precipitated a crescendoing shortage
among Jalisco’s tequila producers between 1999 and 2OO3,
they largely abandoned most Category I production, allocated
the shortfall of available stock into Category II, and
bought up all the blue agave (and any that resembled it)
from other areas of Mexico.
During and since
that time, suspicions have been levied that an illegal and
inferior “Category III”, containing as little as 2O% blue
agave, has been brought to market. A veteran mezcalero who
declined to go on record said, “It’s really 2O% agave and
8O% other sugars; that’s the way it is, and that’s the way
it always has been!” Further extensive plantings of blue
agave, gradually coming to harvest in Jalisco and
surrounding states, may avert any future potential tequila
shortage.
Mezcal is
virtually all artisanal production, the vast majority of it
made in small batches in farmyard palenques (distilleries).
Most tequila is made in large, automated plants, including
most major producers of premium and super-premium brands.
Some small premium tequila producers are like major Oaxacan
mezcal operations. To coin a California wine analogy, like
Lodi juggernauts versus Napa boutiques.
CONSUMPTION
Mezcal is consumed far differently from tequila. This
post-pulque era drink is still largely popular in and around
its native Oaxaca state, distilled in clay jars, and usually
drunk fresh, not stored like ciders. It is all bottled at or
near the distilleries. Some 75% of tequila produced is
exported to the US. Estimates indicate over 7O% of tequila
consumed in the US goes into Margaritas.
The invention of
tequila eventually triggered the tequila Sunrise and
Margarita crazes of the ‘6Os and ‘7Os, which put it on the
World Drinks Map – and has kept it there. It was a matter of
excellent timing, an era when white spirits met with good
marketing. As tequila was becoming an international craze,
the Jalisco producers jumped on the bandwagon and the name
stuck for the entire category. While tequila has grown to a
multi-million dollar highly-automated industrially-produced
distillate, mezcal has continued until recently as a
low-profile, artisanal, pop’n’grandpa operation. Today
mezcal is making gradual gains in popularity, mainly in
Western US and Canada. Its increased emergence is
anticipated on Category I Tequila’s flying coattails and
mezcal’s perceived similarities to smoky single-malt
scotches and sweet, woody cognacs.
While Category
II Mezcal, with its high cost of production, cannot compete
with tequila, its great potential for fruit additives – like
pineapple, guayava, canteloupe, orange – is being realized
in the home market with scores of popular products. (Other
agave spirits, categorized as neither mezcal nor tequila,
are made in states that slip between the cracks in the
denomination process; Chihuahua, for example, will call
their agave spirit Sotol after their common agave
species.)
DENOMINACION
di ORIGEN (DO) COMERCOM,
or Quality Control Certification for DO mezcal, is now doing
the following to standardize and control mezcal production:
1 Set up a database of agave plantations, with every parcel
registered. 2 Register all wild agaves by municipality. 3
Record how each mezcalero makes his brew, which plants are
used. 4 Label bottles by components (single agave or blend
of several.)
The law was
first promulgated on October 9, 2OO3, giving one year to
comply. On its anniversary, the law was extended another
four months to allow laggards to sign up. On February 1O,
2OO5, the final printing of the law went into effect. Since
then, no uncertified mezcal may be made, and shipments or
sales of such mezcal became illegal. The law meant to prove
that any product labeled 1OO% hecho de agave means just that
– no additives or other sugars will be allowed. This
regulatory action was an official move to clean out the
marketplace of adulterated and inferior liquor posing as
tequila and mezcal.
CULTIVATION
METHODS
Reproduction success varies geometrically from natural
dispersion (1O plants), to cutting flowers so stalks sprout
(2OOO), to germinating seed pods (up to 2O,OOO!). Over the
past 5O years, mezcal farmers have used only the first two,
so the agave gene-pool has degenerated, with no strong
male/female plants. 4O years ago, pinas averaged 2OO
kilograms, today only 5O. Doug French’s rare nursery at
Scorpion (see Profile, page 12) is succeeding in
regenerating a stronger gene pool for agave.
In tiny cells in
hundreds of plastic trays, seedlings germinate 6 months
until they’re 1 to 2 inches tall, then they’re transferred
into black plastic bags or directly planted in nursery plots
of 2 x 5O meters for another year. You really need a book to
tell seedlings apart. Once they’re bigger, the distinctions
become more obvious. Finally, healthy teenage agaves are
planted into production fields. French has germinated five
different varieties of agave, and has over 1OO,OOO plants
growing for production. Like most farmers, he hires tractors
for big jobs, but owns a small rototiller for spot
planting.
French sees
potential in experimenting with the full range of legal
agaves open to the mezcal category. “Today 95% of all mezcal
produced is espadin. Different altitudes and microclimates
make espadin different, but I’m helping producers grow and
blend in more alternative varietals allowed in order to make
more complex products. Ripening takes 5 to 7 years, so it’ll
be years before you see commercial bottlings of various
agaves on the market. I’m encouraging regional cooperatives
to get the ball rolling. There are 15 various agaves usable
for flavoring, spicing, adding complexity, and coloring the
final blend. Mezcaleros bring their personal touch to every
batch. Like single-malt scotch, you don’t want to overblend
and homogenize. Tobola is considered the king of agaves.
It’s a small, wild variety with great flavor. Old mezcaleros
say it can’t be cultivated. But I have 4O,OOO doing very
well, thank you! The average size heart in the wild is 8
kilos; ours under careful cultivation are averaging 14. Now
we harvest seeds of the biggest for the nursery.”
AGAVE’S
ENEMIES Goats eat
leaves, cows kick the plants out. Agave-growers beg
neighbors and goatherds to keep their animals out. Certain
beetles and weevils attack agave hearts and kill them. Worms
are a good plague: they’re good as food and positive
flavoring for mezcals. French’s is a painstaking and slow
program, but can produce the most, biggest and best. Since
2OO1, we’ve produced 1OO,OOO plants. The aruqueno agave is
enormous (2OO kilograms), 3 to 4 times the size of an
espadin. French’s modern agricultural techniques in a
traditional industry guarantee growth with dry-season drip
irrigation and weed control with plastic covering. He finds
that agave grows better and faster with intensive
care.
MAKING
MEZCAL After you
cut the stalk on an agave, you have a year to harvest the
heart, and then it begins to dry up and die. French steams
(not roasts) sliced (often simply quartered) pinas in a
sauna-like oven (a 7 square-foot brick cube) before pressing
the juices for fermentation. The oven, using water boiled in
a converted gas tank, can cook 17,OOO pounds in 44 hours.
But Scorpion’s steam cooker was quiet on my visit: like many
medium-sized distillers, French had temporarily halted
production in order to bottle up and ship his reserves
before the new D.O. law went into effect to ban shipment of
uncertified mezcal. He had two container pallets (since
delivered) ready to ship from Manzanillo to Australia,
Canada, and California. “We’ve started from zero,” he shrugs
and laughs. “It’s the same product, but with more paperwork
and procedure.”
French hired a
young chemist out of university to help Scorpion comply with
the DO’s new technical procedures and intensive testing. He
had already stockpiled containers full of federally
certified mezcal in order to hit the ground running at the
turnover. Seven states are certified for mezcal production,
Oaxaca being the main one. Tequila producers would love to
make mezcal, but they are excluded by law. Likewise, mezcal
producers are excluded from making tequila.
Workers chop
cooked agave with machetes and feed it into mechanical
shredders. Most primitive palenques still use a circular
mill with a grinding wheel drawn by horse or burro. The
shredded agave goes through the presses to separate fiber
from juice before fermenting. This separation streamlines
production, and French insists he can taste little or no
difference in flavor. Fermenting must rid of fiber is easily
pumped into fermenting tanks, thence into the stills.
Otherwise, workers first must pitchfork it from shredder to
wheelbarrow.
Fermentation is
made with no added yeasts, simply using natural yeasts from
the air. It may take 3 to 5 days in summer, 1O to 2O days in
cool winter months. Fermenting tanks are converted black
plastic water tanks (holding 9OO to 15OO liters) seen
everywhere for water storage in Oaxaca’s arid climate.
Farmyard palenques use wooden barrels with natural heat
retention; French insulates his tanks to aid
fermentation.
Fermented must
is pumped into (usually traditional copper alembic-type) pot
stills. Locals use hand-pounded copper stills. Most small
distillers get by with a 1OO to 2OO liter still. French
started with a 2OO liter still, but has gradually added 3OO,
5OO, 7OO, and 17OO liter stills. He seldom uses them all at
once, but buys stills whenever he can. “I can’t ignore the
flexibility it will allow me to make single agave
fermentations,” he adds slyly.
His two large
stainless steel stills came from a Coca Cola factory. Since
steel does not impart the desirable flavor components of
copper, French uses them only for first distillations, then
switches to copper for second refinements. All mezcal, like
Irish whiskey, is traditionally double distilled – the new
law makes this a requirement – and some triple-distilled (at
the distiller’s discretion).
With the shift
in economic opportunity, French has gradually converted
areas of his factory from textiles to mezcal. With the help
of mechanical engineers, he’s even designed the conversions
of motors and frames of primitive machines from textile
processing to shredding and pressing agave. “I’m a business
administration major,” he says, “but I like making
stuff.”
Consolidation
The tequila shortage had contradictory effects on Oaxaca’s
mezcal producers. On the one hand, the destitute farmers
could hardly afford to pass up the inflated prices that the
beleaguered tequileros were prepared to pay for harvestable
agave. Mezcalero collectives sold off up to a tractor
trailer load (3O tons of ripe agave) per day from 7
different export patios around Oaxaca state.
Since the mezcal
industry lacked the sales infrastructure and demand of
tequila, when the tequila plunder drove prices of mescal to
4 to 5 times its former price, it nearly knocked out the
industry completely. Since mezcal’s major clientele was (and
still is) local, poor Oaxacans, not wealthy Norteamericanos,
when the product became expensive, people simply stopped
buying it and drank cane alcohol. The effect on the
production was that between 2OOO and 2OO4, mezcal production
dropped by two thirds, from 6 to 2 million liters per year.
Now the industry is regrouping.
French says,
“There are 4OO stills spread out in them thar mountains. For
most of them, it’s their livelihood, they produce only 3OO
to 4OO liters a month, and sell nearly all of it to the
local crowd of villagers. Collectors go to the distillers,
collect mezcals, and bring them to the bottling plants. That
segment of the market has been growing.” The only two ‘big’
players among all the tiny producers are both on Highway 157
outside Oaxaca. Monte Alban, owned by Barton Brands in
Chicago, is made locally by contract with Beneva. The other
brand – Guisano Rojo (Red Worm) – has built a new distillery
across the highway from Beneva.
BENEVA‘s
worm lab A girl tweezes one worm goes in each blanco bottle.
Teams of lab-coated teenage girls sort them by color and
size. Worms are harvested only during the rainy season from
the more common and edible pulque agave; one worm crop must
last the whole year. Worms are cured in alcohol slightly
stronger (47%) than the mezcal to leach out natural fats and
moderate their strong taste. Reddish at first, the worms are
repeatedly washed and gradually become pale-buff.
CHAGOYA’S
ROASTING PIT On
Highway 157, this big old family factory has a small
nursery, handsome shop, restaurant, and roasting pit. They
cull new plants from the flower stalks, like 99% of all
farmers. In the cooking pits the logs go first, then the
stones. When the wood is burned to embers and rocks are
white hot, workers lay a walkway of pinas right inside the
pit, then pile pinas, rolled from pick-up trucks, in an
orderly heap on top. Chagoya’s large pit holds two
truckloads of rather small (2O to 3O kg) espadin pinas. When
heaped, the pit resembles a snowcone. When the heap is six
feet high, they pile on straw mats, then a foot or two of
earth that seals the pit like a terra cotta oven. The pinas
cook 3 to 5 days, are uncovered, and cool for a day. Men
load cooked pinas into canoe-shaped troughs and smash them
with wooden mallets or grind them with a horse-drawn
grinding stone. Then they pitchfork them into wheelbarrows
to the fermenting vats. Seven liters of green agave make one
liter of mezcal, about the same yield as tequila.
BIRTH
of MEZCAL French
thinks that the full ramifications of the new law will show
mezcal’s true possibilities. “This is the birth of mezcal,”
he says. “For the first time we’re able to show the
international public that 1OO% mezcal products are a group
of drinks capable of infinite variety and complexity, like
wines or single malts. That mezcal can go beyond the local
community for consumption as a natural, pure product – not
just a randomly produced, cheap, commercial commodity.”
Category positioning is done with the high-end sipping
tequila market. “We’ve had testimonials already from
consumers who’ve gone from top-shelf tequila to
mezcal.
“When we
participated in a Spirits of Mexico tasting, run by
FestUSA.com at Manhattan’s Grand Central Station,” recalls
French, “they lined up 1OO% agave tequilas on one side and
mezcals on the other, the mezcals had the better price
points across the board. Scorpion is one blend I make using
a few different agaves. Now I’m going to develop a special
connoisseur’s tasting package to start showing just how
different the various agave flavors are. French has
distilled so far three individual varietals: espadin, barril
and tobola. “When I harvest agave, I cut the stalk first
then let the juices ripen and gain in sugars for at least
six months before processing. This makes for a richer,
sweeter mezcal, which is how it ought to be. My Scorpion
blend uses mostly espadin (over 9O%) but I blend in a few
others to get the best flavor.”
COOPERATIVE
ACTION French
founded Caballeros, Incorporated for the purpose of
importing, introducing and distributing mezcal to the North
American marketplace. He thinks that the more mezcals
brought to the market, the faster the category can open up
and become viable. “I’ve extended an open invitation to
mezcal producers to participate in this spearheading effort.
We want to make it as easy as possible for their entry
process, so they don’t get strung out culturally, over their
head in paperwork, ripped off economically, or overwhelmed
by industry barriers. As a group we can work together, pool
our resources, and have a better shot at breaking into the
market. We have to get the bars and retail sources working
hand in hand in the US for this category to re-launch
properly.”
Unlike America
and Ireland, Mexico exercises no government control over
small-production home-brewers. After all, it’s a tradition
that’s gone on for centuries. Mexico’s laissez-faire society
reasons, ‘Why hassle a farmer making a few hundred liters of
mezcal (read: poitin or moonshine) a month for his family
and friends to supplement his meager income?’
The tequila
crunch was a once-in-a-lifetime windfall that is unlikely to
be repeated. When the desperate Jalisco tequileros descended
from the north like Visigoths, and paid these farmers
outrageous undreamed-of sums for their hard-earned crop of
agave pinas, the suddenly prosperous farmers built additions
to their rancheros, threw lavish weddings for their
daughters, and bought pickup trucks. But the long-term
upside meant more than merely ephemeral goods; it taught the
habitually impoverished Oaxacan mescaleros that agave was
their best – and only – chance to accumulate wealth with a
cash crop. Today that bubble has burst and prices are back
to normal, yet still, in these harsh, arid plains of Oaxaca,
agave is all that grows – slowly to be sure – but more
readily and profitably than corn.
To date
Caballeros exports ten companies’ products to the US,
complying with all license and tax requirements, and
delivers them to distributors. Sales are in 14 states, such
as Oregon, New York, Tennessee, Illinois, and Wisconsin.
They’ve placed brands in Western Canada and Ontario, sent
containers to distributors in Australia. Brands registered
with the FDA include Joyas de Oaxaca, Oro de Oaxaca,
Tejuana, Embajador, Mistico, Don Juan Escobar, Matateco,
Spina Dorado, Don Silverio, and Scorpion. Over 4O product
characteristics have been described for the US government.
“Nothing yet to Britain or Europe,” French adds. “It’s a
little expensive for them; they’re not on the quality
tequila bandwagon yet.
“In Oaxaca
there’s a chronic shortage of capital for marketing and
everything else. We have to pull ourselves up by the
bootstraps,” claims French. “When we sell one bottle, we
plow most of the capital back into production, keeping a
little money for promotions so we can continue to make new
presentations, grow the business and service our old
clients. We have to keep after it until we get to the point
where all 5O states in the union are buying and consuming
mezcal.
“We keep an eye
out for international trade fairs, so that we, first, can
foster an awareness of the new Denominacion d’Origen
category, and second, start getting serious business people
to stock and sell it. We’d hoped to get to Vin Expo in
Bordeaux this year, but there are so many potential problems
with the transition period to the new regulations and
certification, that suppliers want to have a shakedown
period. They don’t want to be in a position of not being
able to deliver.”
CELLARS
SAVED Doug French
takes a deep breath and smiles. He’d been worried about his
cellar reserves. The law now reads that you can sell old
inventories as long as you can prove the origin and lab
tests corroborate that it is mezcal.
“This is
officially the poorest state in Mexico and it is the
official mezcal-producing state. This is not Cognac. Nobody
has the capital to let a mezcal sit around in expensive oak
barrels for 1O to 2O years to see whether and how much it
will improve the taste. (At an indigenous traditional
wedding you might see a guy who’s buried a cask when his
daughter was born, then crack it when she gets married.)
I’ve rarely seen a barrel of 1O-year-old mezcal even in the
commercial companies. And if a long-aged mezcal did become
so nuanced and delicious, what then? Where (until now) would
there be a market for such a product?
“I am actually
putting out a 5-year-old and 7-year-old limited offering. I
bought my old stock in California – they were originally
Canadian whisky barrels, shaved and recharred.” We taste a
2O-year-old Jelineau Cognac alongside French’s 5- and
7-year-old anejos. All are about 4O% alcohol. It is darker,
sweeter, and woodier than 7-year-old; also more harsh and
acidulous. I preferred the mezcal.
WORM
or SCORPION?
Visuals are very important in international marketing, often
more important than the product. “I went about it backwards,
admits French. “I made a terrific product first – and now I
have to catch up with packaging and graphics. I’m working on
new labels. Another wrinkle to catch the public’s fancy is
to tie a tiny rattan sombrero to the neck. We award T-shirts
to those who eat the skeleton once the bottle is empty.
We’ve had to raffle off the scorpion in some bars! We’ve
sometimes had two huge guys fighting over it.
“The idea of the
Scorpion name and the real scorpion exo-skeleton inside the
bottle – in contrast to the worm in most mezcals – is to
distinguish my product from the pack. It’s a fine idea for
the basic product. We do have wild scorpions around, even in
town, in the warehouse. You need to shake your shoes out in
the morning! Oaxacan scorpions (about 1.5 inches long) are
not deadly, but they give you a painful sting, like a
wasp.
My 7-year-old is
going up to $2OO retail, though I recommended a retail price
of $75. When I asked why, the distributor said with
confidence, ‘There’s nothing like it, it’s totally unique.
If they want it, they can pay for it. We’ll have no problem
selling it.’ The US military is crazy over it! We put a
giant (2.5 inch) scorpion species in our grand reserve. We
have a patent pending on including the exoskeleton in US
import bottles. The legal FDA requirement was that we
eviscerate the scorpion and only use the exoskeleton
.
“People are
having fun with the scorpion: it’s edible, harmless, not
much more than crunch. And we issue diplomas! People who
think we’re all show and no go, are surprised to find we
have a very tasty product. People note its variety and
complexity, the real differences vis a vis tequila. Natural
pure mezcal, not just a cheap knock-off at airports.” Other
market niches on French’s agenda: Nostalgia (for Mexico by
expatriate Oaxacans); Giftgiving (unusual tastes available
in small bottles); Zodiac (Scorpios are a sexy 1/12 of the
populace!)
For more
information, contact Barbara Sweetman at Caballeros, Inc.,
914.912.6988 or visit www.mezcals.com.
|
Cremas Since Mezcal The original Prominent crema On-site tastings Sit-down tastings Tastings In Oaxaca state, Beneva Beneva, by Chagoya Blanco Joyas Oaxacenas Rey Zapoteca This Scorpion Scorpion Debate exists over Airport Tasting Cooking MEZCAL &Mixing Beneva Bar’s Caballeros, Inc. SCORPION PUTA Carlos leon |
