Through the years, I’ve blithely joked that tequila makes me cry. Imbibing on the blue agave spirit does tend to inspire me to be more outwardly emotional than usual, and overall, the spirit isn’t my drink of choice. But being in the land of tequila and learning firsthand about the process, one could say I was inspired, and motivated to move past my perpetual tequila indifference.
Our guides had taken us on a tour of Patrón’s facilities and distilling process. It was only after I missed several cues that I realized it was my turn to get involved in the unearthing process. At the direction of the jimador, I shoved a metal tool that looked like a thermometer into the heart of one of the piñas he’d just finished cutting down. My guide quickly translated into English that the tool was used to measure the amount of sugar within the piña that had just been harvested.
Throughout the rest of my time in Jalisco, thought about what it took to make every tequila I drank. Beyond the labor itself, what stuck with me was how central ancestral tradition is to the making of tequila. But the one thing that stuck with me beyond the sightseeing and tasting of several tequilas within was how central tradition and ancestral practice is to the fruit of labor that is a bottle of tequila.
The practice of being a jimador is often generational; a father teaches the art to a son, nephew, or another family member, and when they are of age, they take the baton, making this trade their own. In areas that are otherwise unreachable — in valleys or on mountaintops — jimadores set out on a tequila quest in teams of up to seven people, filling trucks with piñas, that will be cooked, crushed, and fermented at distilleries before landing in a bottle for consumption and delight.
In a world where buzzy celebrity-backed tequila lines are on-trend, especially when viewed as another way of creating a lucrative income stream, there is importance in looking to the artisanal and indigenous practices that are the foundation of what it means to appreciate tequila.
What we drink and the food we eat are not merely touchstones of our tastes and preferences. They can also be a ritual of remembrance connecting us to those who came before us, those who studied a craft to become truly good at something. We eat, we taste, we drink in celebration of them and of ourselves. We honor them and ourselves in continuing to reach for our ancestral and cultural foods.
by Nneka M. Okona, Eater | Read more:
Image: Michelle K. Min
[ed. The links are key here, like this one (The Ultimate Guide to Tequila).]
Tequila is actually a denomination of origin comprising all of Jalisco, and some municipalities in the states of Nayarit, Tamaulipas, Michoacán, and Guanajuato. To qualify as a tequila, Mexico’s most famous spirit can only be made with agave tequilana Weber azul, or blue agave, from this region. The finished tequila must have a minimum of 51 percent blue agave, although the majority of tequila is 100 percent blue agave, allowing for up to 1 percent additives. Tequilas must also be a minimum of 35 percent to 55 percent ABV, and bottles sold in the United States require a minimum ABV of 40 percent (water is used to lower the proof to the desired number).
These strict regulations do still offer considerable variations to the tequila consumer. There are some 1,377 brands registered by the Consejo Regulador del Tequila (CRT), the regulatory board that upholds the standards of tequila manufacturing tracked by the Norma Oficial Mexico (NOM) for the Appellation of Origin. But the system is not without its flaws. In recent years, the CRT has allowed brands to add up to 1 percent additives to 100 percent blue agave tequila without disclosure. It has also allowed celebrities to easily release tequilas, including George Clooney, Xzibit, and Kendall Jenner, who has faced backlash for cultural appropriation over the launch of her 818 Tequila. It’s a practice that seems at odds with a legal body tasked with preserving tequila and Mexican tradition.
