1 | THE MAGUEY (Agave)
Each maguey can take up to 9 years to fully mature, therefore, each maguey is thoroughly vetted before we convert it to mezcal. Once matured, the selected maguey is skillfully harvested with machetes and coas (specialized harvesting tool) by our jimadors (agave harvesters). For our mezcal we harvest both domesticated and wild varieties of agaves, such as the espadin agave and the tobala agave, respectively.
2 | COOKING
After harvesting the best agaves, we place agave in a concentric underground oven to cook for more than a week. The oven is made of dozens of river rocks and heated using Encino wood. It's here where our mezcal’s hints of sweetness and delicate humid tones develop.
3 | MILLING
Once the maguey has been thoroughly roasted to perfection, we transfer the maguey to our horse-drawn mill. The mill, known as a tahona chilena, is used to grind, press, and rip apart the fibrous maguey in order to extract its delectable nectar.
4 | FERMENTATION
After milling, we transfer the grinded maguey into oak barrels and add fresh spring water. It's here where indigenous yeasts found in the region begin to convert the natural sugars present in the agave into alcohol. This fermentation process can take several days to complete, whether its delays caused by the local weather or the maestro mezcalero’s fine-tuning process.
5 | DISTILLATION
Using encino, ocote, and mezquite varieties of wood we heat a traditional copper still to distill our mezcal. We use a drop-by-drop distillation process and make sure to cut the heads and tails out of the distillate to ensure only the finest mezcal, imbued with centuries of tradition, is obtained.