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Mezcal / Tequila
Mezcal is a Mexican distilled spirit made from the agave plant. There are many different types of agaves, and each produces a slightly different mezcal. Agave is part of the Agavaceae family, also called maguey. While Tequila is a mezcal made only from the blue agave plant in the region around Tequila, Jalisco, spirits labeled Mezcal are made from other agave plants and are not part of the Tequila family. Mezcal is made from the heart of the agave plant. After the agave matures (6-8 years) it is harvested by jimadores (field workers) and the leaves are chopped off using a long-handled knife known as a coa or coa de jima, leaving only the large hearts, or piñas (Spanish for pineapple). The piña is then cooked and then crushed, producing a mash.
Traditionally, the piñas were baked in palenques: large (8-12 ft diameter) rock-lined conical pits in the ground. The pits were lined with hot rocks, then agave leaves, petate (palm fiber mats), and earth. The piñas are allowed to cook in the pit for three to five days. This lets them absorb flavors from the earth and wood smoke. After the cooking, the piñas are rested for a week, and then placed in a ring of stone or concrete of about 12 ft diameter, where a large stone wheel attached to a post in the middle is rolled around, crushing the piñas. Modern makers usually cook the piñas in huge stainless steel ovens and then crush them with mechanical crushers. The mash is then placed in large, 300-500 gallon wooden vats and 5%–10% water is added to the mix. The mash (tepache) is covered with petate and is left to naturally ferment with its own yeasts and microbes for four to thirty days. To the resulting mash, cane and corn sugars, as well as some chemical yeasts, may be added. The government only requires that 51% of this mix be from agave. The resulting mix is then fermented for a couple of days in large stainless steel vats.
The worm in the mezcal bottle is a marketing gimmick. The worm is actually the caterpillar Hypopta agavis. The originator of this practice was a man named Jacobo Lozano Páez. In 1940, while tasting prepared agave, he and his partner found that the worm changed the taste of the agave. (Agave worms are sometimes found in the piña after harvesting, a sign of badly chosen, infested, agave). Brands of mezcal that contain the worm include 'Gusano de Oro', 'Gusano Rojo', 'Monte Alban', and 'Dos Gusanos'. Contrary to public belief, tequila is, by law, not allowed to contain the worm.
In 1656 the village of Tequila (named for the local Ticuilas Indians) was granted a charter by the governor of New Galicia. Tax records of the time show that Mezcal was already being produced in the area. This Mezcal, made from the local blue agave, established a reputation for having a superior taste, and barrels of the "Mezcal wine from Tequila" were soon being shipped to nearby Guadalajara and more distant cities such as the silver-mining boomtowns of San Luis Potosí and Aguascalientes. The oldest of the still-existing distilleries in Tequila dates back to 1795, when the Spanish Crown granted a distiller’s license to a local padrone by the name of José Cuervo. In 1805 a distillery was established that would ultimately come under the control of the Sauza family. By the mid 1800s there were dozens of distilleries and millions of agave plants under cultivation around Tequila in what had become the state of Jalisco. Gradually, the locally-produced Mezcal came to be known as Tequila (just as the grape brandy from the Cognac region in France came to be known simply as Cognac).
Mexico achieved independence from Spain in 1821. But until the 1870s it was a politically unstable country that experienced frequent changes in government, revolutions, and a disastrous war with the United States. Marauding bands of soldiers and guerillas extracted "revolutionary taxes" and "voluntary" contributions in kind from the tabernas and distilleries. In 1876 a general named Porfirio Díaz, who was from the Mezcal-producing state of Oaxaca, came to power and ushered in a 35-year period of relative peace and stability known as the Porfiriato. It was during this period that the Tequila industry became firmly established. Modest exports of Tequila began to the United States and Europe, with Jose Cuervo shipping the first three barrels to El Paso, Texas in 1873. By 1910 the number of agave distilleries in the state of Jalisco had grown to almost 100.
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I would have liked to, and was expecting to, have an exciting visual day, but I seemed to be unable to escape self-analysis. At the peak of the experience I was quite intoxicated and hyper with energy, so that it was not hard to move around. I was quite restless. But I spent most of the day in considerable agony, attempting to break through without success. I learned a great deal about myself and my inner workings. Everything almost was, but in the final analysis, wasn't. I began to become aware of a point, a brilliant white light, that seemed to be where God was entering, and it was inconceivably wonderful to perceive it and to be close to it. One wished for it to approach with all one's heart. I could see that people would sit and meditate for hours on end just in the hope that this little bit of light would contact them. I begged for it to continue and come closer but it did not. It faded away not to return in that particular guise the rest of the day. Listening to Mozart's Requiem, there were magnificent heights of beauty and glory. The world was so far away from God, and nothing was more important than getting back in touch with Him. But I saw how we created the nuclear fiasco to threaten the existence of the planet, as if it would be only through the threat of complete annihilation that people might wake up and begin to become concerned about each other. And so also with the famines in Africa. Many similar scenes of joy and despair kept me in balance. I ended up the experience in a very peaceful space, feeling that though I had been through a lot, I had accomplished a great deal. I felt wonderful, free, and clear.
Spirits: Tequila and Mezcal
Tequila, and its country cousin Mezcal, are made by distilling the fermented juice of agave plants in Mexico. The agave is a spiky-leafed member of the lily family (it is not a cactus) and is related to the century plant. By Mexican law the agave spirit called Tequila can be made only from one particular type of agave, the blue agave (Agave Tequiliana Weber), and can be produced only in specifically designated geographic areas, primarily the state of Jalisco in west-central Mexico.
Mezcal del Maguey
In actual fact, all tequilas are mezcal. As a producer of mezcal made only using the blue agave, the town of Tequila had acquired a certain fame by the early nineteenth century. Since 1950, the Mexican government has designated five states as legal production regions of the blue agave and several other states have been allowed to call their mezcal tequila. The first mention of tequila as a beverage is in the town's tax record of 1873. There is an entry showing that three barrels of vino de mezcal de la region de tequila "mezcal wine from the region of tequila" were sent to Santa Fe, New Mexico via El Paso, Texas.