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Refined Tequilas, Meant to Be Savored
By ERIC ASIMOV
Take it from Eben Freeman, a cocktail consultant,
"It's always surprising to find people knowledgeable
about tequila and margaritas,"
Mr. Freeman said.
Surprising? Aren't tequila and margaritas part
of the all-American rite of raucous partying that
makes so many Mexican restaurants look like college
frat houses? Although they may not remember
in the morning, Americans have been getting to
know rotgut tequila for decades, through machine
- churned frozen margaritas or the old lick-the-salt,
knock-it-back, suck-the-lime method.
But the American relationship with tequila has
been changing. While tequila sales in the United States
have grown vigorously in the last few years,
high-end and superpremium brands, the kind that you
wouldn't want to drown with sweetened mango-and-nectarine
syrup, have led the way by far.
Sales in these categories have increased by more
than 20 percent per year since 2002, according to
the Distilled Spirits Council, a trade group.
Yet despite tequila's popularity, Mr. Freeman is right.
It remains little understood and sadly undervalued.
Simply put, tequila is one of the world's greatest
spirits, thrillingly complex and thoroughly distinctive.
Most cheap tequilas bear scant resemblance to
tequila at it best. Like squares of American cheese that
get the job done on a burger but cannot begin
to suggest the majesty of a great Parmesan, cheap tequila
serves its purpose when the primary goal is intoxication,
but offers only a hint of tequila's real stature.
Along with Mr. Freeman, Florence Fabricant and
I were joined for the tasting by Sue Torres, the chef
and an owner of Sueños, a Mexican restaurant
in New York that emphasizes the richness of Mexican
cuisine and the role of tequila in its enjoyment.
We had two requirements for the tequilas. First,
they had to be made from 100 percent blue agave.
Tequila is made from the distilled sap of the
blue agave, which is a succulent (but not a cactus).
The best tequilas are 100 percent agave, while
lesser (he means shit) mixto tequilas can
squeak by
with a minimum 51 percent agave. If the label
does not say 100 percent agave, it is a mixto.
shit.
The second requirement was that they be reposados.
What?
Tequilas have three levels of aging.
The youngest tequilas are called blanco, or sometimes
plato or silver. They are essentially bottled
without aging. The oldest are the añejos.
They must be aged at least a year in oak barrels, though
they generally spend three to five years in oak.
In the middle are reposados, which rest in oak barrels
from two to 12 months.
Personally, I have always liked blancos best.
This guy doesn't like tequila.
They offer an undiluted taste of what tequila
is all about, with pronounced citrus, mineral and herbal
aromas and flavors in varying proportions depending
on whose tequila you're tasting. I love a good
margarita, served straight up with salt, but
frankly a great blanco tequila is almost like a margarita
without the cocktail additions — the salt and
citrus flavors are built in. All it lacks is sweetness.
I have nothing against añejo tequilas,
but it seems to me that barrel aging diminishes the qualities that
make tequila singular. The rough edges are all
smoothed out and the tequila sometimes takes on a
caramel flavor, more like a Cognac or an aged
rum. Yet many fans swear by the sipping virtues of
añejos, and I do not doubt them. Añejos
are generally not for mixing into cocktails.
Right, you don't pour ketchup on a $40 steak, either.
That leaves reposados, which are... what? Somewhere
in between, I guess. Reposados account for
more than half of all tequila sales in Mexico,
but in the United States they are something of an enigma.
For me, the tasting of 21 reposados went a long
way toward answering my questions about what to do
with them. First of all, reposados come in a
range of styles and flavors, as our top three tequilas illustrate.
Our No. 1 bottle, the El Tesoro de Don Felipe,
seemed to display all of the explosiveness of a blanco
tequila. It was full of citrus, herbal and saline
flavors, yet it was exceptionally smooth at the same time.
The Herradura, our No. 2 bottle, was on the añejo
side of the reposado spectrum, mellow and also
complex, but with other sorts of flavors like
butter and caramel standing out. Positioned in the middle
was the Chinaco, our No. 3 bottle,
which had the briny, herbal, vegetal characteristics of a blanco
but the easygoing balance of an añejo.
Such a balancing act is not easy for a distiller,
and we were all impressed by the high quality of almost
all of the tequilas we tasted. On the blanco
side among the top 10 were the Frida Kahlo, named for the
great Mexican artist, and, at $65, the most expensive
tequila in the tasting, and the Corazón, which at $34,
was our best value. On the añejo side
were the Gran Centenario, the Don Julio and the Siembra Azul.
And somewhere in the middle were the Casa Noble
and the Cabo Wabo. Incidentally, the Cabo Wabo
brand is owned by Sammy Hagar, who follows in
a tradition of entertainers associating themselves with
fine tequila. The first were Bing Crosby and
Phil Harris, who originally imported Herradura into the
United States in the 1950's.
I did not know that, or maybe I did and forgot.
A shot of the good stiff for Bing and Phil.
Some bottles that didn't make our top 10 are still
worth noting. I particularly liked the Familia Partida,
which I found elegant and seductive, and the
Espolon, which had a racy blend of fruit and pepper flavors.
The question remains, what do you do with reposados?
The intuitive answer is, anything you want.
Both Ms. Torres and Mr. Freeman believe they
can make fine margaritas, slightly smoother than a
blanco margarita, and it's easy to sense how
delicious they can be, though you wouldn't want to
waste anything but a mixto on a frozen margarita.
And reposados are fine for sipping.
But why not consider a favored Mexican way of
drinking tequila? Instead of the salt-and-lime method,
try chasing a sip of tequila with a shot of sangrita,
a spicy blend of tomato, orange juice, lemon or lime
juice and chili? And how about what Ms. Torres
called the authentic Mexican margarita? Tequila mixed
with Squirt, the Mexican citrus soda.
Come to think of it, save that method for the
mixto.
shit.
Dude, you need to be in Vegas Sept 16 for the BartCop Tequila Class.
I'll let you taste some stuff that'll make you say the F word.