The Spirit of Oaxaca

Dotted throughout the central valley of Oaxaca, there are clusters of small family run distilleries, called Palenques, where this fiery brew is created. The ancestors of today's mezcaleros probably were pulqueros, producers of pulque, a beer-type fermentation of the plant. The process for distilling spirits was brought to Mexico by the Spanish and by the 1800's both mezcal and tequila were being produced in large quantities.

The process for making mezcal, and its "cousin" tequila, is identical. If you want to make tequila, you use the blue agave; to make mezcal, you use the maguey. This process has remained largely unchanged to this day. Forget about those long graceful green spears that comprise most of the visible part of the maguey. These are trimmed with a few skillful flicks of the machete, leaving the solid center of the plant, which is then cut off or dug from the ground. These bulbs which can weigh more then 15 kilos are roasted in a conical oven in the ground for 6 to 12 hours. As the hot roasted cores are removed from the oven, they are literally dripping with sugar which has been released from the heart of the plant.

The roasted cores are then crushed into a sweet pulpy mass in a simple stone-wheel mill powered by an ox or horse. The pulp is collected and placed in a large wooden vat and mixed with water. This mix, depending on variables such as temperature and sugar content, will need from 4 to 8 days to produce the desired amount of alcohol. A simple still is used to separate the alcohol from the pulp. A still has two sides, one very hot, the other very cool. The hot side consists of a large copper kettle, set in stone or concrete above a fire pit. The cool side is a stone or concrete tank of water with a spring-shaped coil of copper tubing inside.

The kettle is filled with fermented mash from the vat and brought to a boil. The alcohol vaporises and passes from the hot side to the cool side through the connecting pipe, cools in the coil, and comes out of the spigot as mezcal.

Ask the mezcaleros how to select a great mezcal and they'll tell you las perlas. These "pearls" are actually small bubbles which form on the surface of the mezcal as it is poured into a glass. The more pearls the better. Clarity is also important. Pure mezcal is crystal clear and colorless, unless it has been aged, añejo or madurado, or reposada, "rested". This aged mezcal takes on a much smoother finish and a lovely light gold color. Mezcal is often made from blending several different types of maguey. The espadin maguey is popular because of its sweetness, the tobala maguey because of its strength and smoothness.