Snobbery and barrel-aged mezcal: how the “experts” in Oaxaca and the world are wrong

It is an issue that negatively impacts the consumption of mezcal on a daily basis. Many owners and employees of Mexican restaurants, bars, and mezcalerías, in Oaxaca and throughout the rest of Mexico, and indeed throughout the world, tell customers not to drink barrel-aged mezcal. It does not matter if it is rested (in oak for at least two months) or aged (at least one year); They say just don’t do it. Even some export brand owners fall victim to the misstep. The Mexican agave distillate, mezcal, is the relatively high-alcohol spirit that has taken the global community of spirits consumers by storm since the “mezcal boom.” The craze started around 2005, then caught on a decade later.

The people who should know better, and who are supposedly motivated in their entrepreneurial efforts at least to some extent to promote the mezcal industry, are simply trying to increase their customers’ perception of them as experts in agave distillate. Oaxaca is the southern state of Mexico that produces more than 85% of the country’s mezcal. Amateurs and novices alike flock to Oaxaca to learn more and pay homage. And so it should be incumbent on the experts, particularly in Oaxaca, who are trusted by the consuming public, to give arriving pilgrims the right products. Many don’t.

Generally, one finds three reasons to dissuade drinkers from drinking aged mezcal:

• “Aged mezcal is not traditional.” How many generations or hundreds of years ago should agave distillate be considered “traditional”, given that oak barrels have been used to store and transport mezcal probably since shortly after the Spanish arrived in what is now Mexico? , certainly since the eighteenth century?
• “I haven’t found a good reposado or barrel-aged añejo yet.” How can that really be, other than someone wanting to impose their subjective preference on others, since there are brands that have serious and well thought out aging programs? For example, aging for six months in a Kentucky bourbon barrel, then two years in a French chardonnay barrel.
• “Aged mezcal changes and masks the natural flavor, aroma, and nuances that vary by species and subspecies of agave, and we must want to retain and appreciate those unique qualities and differences.”

It’s the third reason that is the most problematic, possibly just pointless, and here’s why.

In a typical scenario, we have a night out on the town, one goes to a mezcal tasting room, bar or mezcalería, or Mexican restaurant with a nice complement of agave distillates. Trust the advice of the bartender or service staff; especially those relatively new to the spirit or just wanting to try different products. Your server might say something like “try this tobala, it’s quite herbal”, or “how about a floral tepeztate?” or “I think you’ll like this somewhat sweet karwinskii from the Miahuatlán district of Oaxaca.” Fair enough. But then the problem begins.

That same “expert” who refuses to even talk about añejos or reposados ​​because they alter the unique hue imparted by the particular agave variety, will suggest a brisket espadin (costs perhaps twice as much as karwinskii). That breast has had the natural sprat flavor dramatically altered not only by the chicken breast, but also by a plethora of fruits, herbs and spices; apple, orange, cinnamon, guava, pineapple, almond, banana, anise, rice, apricot, and sometimes more. Aren’t you drinking a spirit whose natural flavor has been altered much more dramatically than if it had been aged six months in a bourbon barrel? And while the history of brisket dates back perhaps to the 1930s in the state of Oaxaca, and to the 19th century elsewhere in Mexico, the barrel-aging tradition predates both by 100 years, if not more. Briskets are probably a much more recent and much less traditional phenomenon than reposados ​​and añejos.

Then your server in that tasting room encourages you to compare two mezcals of the same subspecies, one clay-distilled and the other copper-distilled, suggesting you can spot the difference in flavors. Afterwards, the server may offer a fermented mezcal in cowhide followed by the next in a 1,000-liter pine-slatted tank. And then two mezcals of the same variety of agave from the same traditional distillery can be offered, one in which the succulent has been crushed by hand and the other with metal blades. Why, then, won’t she “allow” him to compare the old with the non-old? He would suggest that it is probably snobbery, plain and simple, for no other reasonable reason (except perhaps the exercise that represents a means by which the expertly run establishment tries to rationalize its lofty prices).

Here is the problem. If one really wants to help consumers distinguish subtle differences in flavors, aromas, and nuances, shouldn’t we just try mezcal in which the agave has been steamed in a sealed brick chamber or autoclave (iron chamber)? ? Traditional cooking dictates that you bake the agave in an airtight oven buried on top of, at the very least, rocks, and you guessed it, firewood. If you bake something in a sealed chamber for five days over wood, the type of log used inevitably affects the flavor of whatever you’re baking, including the agave; mesquite, oak, eucalyptus, etc., etc., etc. The experts just want to promote traditional mezcal, so how do they rationalize wanting the natural flavors to come through on the one hand and baking in a “traditional” oven on the other?

There are brand owners who are anti-aging and claim to want to expose amateurs or aspiring amateurs only to traditionally made mezcal. They state that mezcal should be stored only in glass or stainless steel, neither of which is “traditional”, let alone stainless. The entrepreneurs themselves will promote their products by storing some mezcal in clay for, say, six months before bottling, to give the consuming public something a little different, but certainly not too different, like in oak. Yes, clay was used eons ago for storage and transportation, so maybe we should all re-age our mezcal in clay. The problem is that glass and stainless steel alter natural hues much less than clay; however, they are relatively recent forays into the industry.

Epilogue

We should be promoting mezcal to all possible future fans, and this means all mezcal. Many visitors to Oaxaca arrive with a plan to distribute the spirit, or open a mezcalería, in their home countries outside of North America. If we tell them that they shouldn’t be drinking or selling aged mezcal, they might believe that phrase from the “experts” who are giving them half-truths, and quite possibly creating confusion in the minds of those who pay careful consideration to what they hear. . Aren’t we removing the potential to attract new spirit drinkers, such as those drinkers who gravitate towards single malts, scotch, bourbon or whiskey? More importantly, the rationale for telling people what mezcal they should and shouldn’t drink is seriously flawed.