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Consider pechuga. It\u2019s a subcategory of mezcal with close ties to celebration culture across the Mexican distilling tradition, famously made by suspending a basket of food products above an active still. This sometimes includes mole or spice blends, and it has always included raw protein, like turkey or chicken breast (the word \u201cpechuga\u201d means \u201cbreast\u201d in Spanish) in the mix. Deer, quail, and rabbit sometimes show up, too, as do iguana, snake and even lobster.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n In researching this story it was my privilege to sip my way through twenty different destilado con expressions, each one a galaxy of flavors unto themselves. For the destilado con-curious, here\u2019s a tight selection of favorites.<\/span><\/p>\n Zinacantan \u201c<\/b>Destilado Con Vanilla<\/b><\/a>\u201d<\/b> Salvadores \u201c<\/b>Destilado con Elote<\/b><\/a>\u201d<\/b> Rey Campero \u201c<\/b>Ponche de Frutas<\/b><\/a>\u201d <\/b> Macurichos \u201c<\/b>Destilado con Cacao<\/b><\/a>\u201d <\/b> Pal\u2019alma Limpia Almas<\/b>
<\/p>\n Pechuga is <\/span>controversial in the mezcal world<\/span><\/a>. And now an emerging subcategory of the subcategory is coming on strong, growing in popularity and helping to redefine\u2014and perhaps complicate\u2014the wider pechuga paradigm. It goes by many names: \u201cdestilado con,\u201d \u201cagave spirit with natural flavors,\u201d and even, controversially, \u201cvegan pechuga\u201d (more on that term in a moment). This is a manner of distilling mezcal alongside a chef\u2019s kitchen of flavors and botanicals, fruits and nuts and spices, while omitting the protein entirely. Unless you count the horse-drawn tahona employed by some palenques,<\/span> no animals were harmed in the making of this product.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n
\u201c10 years ago destilado con was unheard of in the United States,\u201d says Fred Sanchez, who imports mezcal as <\/span>Cultura Maguey<\/span><\/a> and represents the brands <\/span>Agua del Sol<\/span><\/a> and <\/span>Yuku Savi<\/span><\/a>. Today there are more than 50 destilado con bottlings commercially available across the U.S. market, and it seems like all the top mezcal producers are getting into the game. There\u2019s vanilla and Papalom\u00e9tl agave distilled by Fabiola Torres Monfil <\/span>at <\/span>Zinacantan<\/span><\/a>, delicious \u201cponche de frutas\u201d Christmas punch from the Parada family at <\/span>Rey Campero<\/span><\/a> and outstanding Espadin distilled with cactus fruit by Alejandrina & Nicolas Hernandez Arag\u00f3n for <\/span>Rezpiral<\/span><\/a>, plus dozens more, including multiple bottles distilled with all the flowers and fragrant herbs of the Dia de Los Muertos ofrenda from <\/span>Pal\u2019alma<\/span><\/a>, <\/span>Cuish<\/span><\/a>, <\/span>Bozal<\/span><\/a> and <\/span>5 Sentidos<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n
It was one of these Day of the Dead bottles that first jumped out and grabbed me, served neat after dinner at the (now temporary closed) Brooklyn fine dining restaurant <\/span>Ilis<\/span><\/a>. One sip and I was blown away: it was the precise sensation of drinking liquid incense, heavy with flower petal oils and the suspended psychotropic matter of departed souls. The bottle came <\/span>from Pal\u2019alma<\/span><\/a>, the Mexico City-based mezcal label and tasting room founded by Erick Rodriguez. He\u2019s been working on an ongoing series of annual destilado con releases in Mexico since 2012\u2014today counting more than 30 in total\u2014and started bringing sample bottles across the border for agave spirit events like <\/span>Mexico in a Bottle<\/span><\/a> shortly thereafter.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n
<\/p>\n I\u2019m hesitant to ascribe a \u201cpatient zero\u201d status to any one purveyor of destilado con, and traditions like the medicinal infusion of Sonora mountain agave distillate (Bacanora) with the local uvalama shrub appear to go back generations. (Uvalama is technically a <\/span>drupe<\/span><\/a> and related genetically to coffee cherry; Bacanora Mazot <\/span>has a bottling<\/span><\/a> that tastes wonderful served alongside espresso.) But Rodriguez and Pal\u2019alma undoubtedly helped popularize the practice and own considerable claim on helping launch the vogue for this style of mezcal. \u201cI started this trend,\u201d Rodriguez says, in no uncertain terms, \u201cand at first people accused me of breaking tradition, but now everyone is doing it.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n
<\/p>\n Fifteen years on from Pal\u2019alma\u2019s first primal yawls towards creating the genre, the \u201cdestliado con\u201d mezcal subgenre can be found from Sonora to Oaxaca, Puebla to Guerrero, as open-minded and enterprising mezcaleros and mezcaleras embrace the flavor possibilities of the style. No two producers make their juice the same way, and destilado con<\/span> as a category is home to a broad cross section of techniques and interpretations. The finished products themselves range from light whisperings of flavor to bold, unmistakable expressions of fruits, herbs and culture. Some distillers suspend fruits and vegetables above the still, the same as they might hang meat for pechuga; others submerge their additions in mesh or cloth, or else add flavor components directly into the still. This total immersion style is the method Pal\u2019alma prefers: all of their destilado con offerings, including huitlacoche, tamarindo and the extraordinary Ofrenda and Limpia Almas bottlings are made by the same mezcalero, based in Puebla, whose name Rodriguez declined to divulge.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n
<\/p>\n Now, about that term: \u201cvegan pechuga.\u201d It\u2019s divisive\u2014no one in the agave space is opinionless on the topic\u2014and arrives at the discourse with considerable baggage. I first heard it used across the counter at SF Tequila Shop, one of the <\/span>best agave bottle shops<\/span><\/a> in the country, in conversation with Scott Jeffrey, who helps manage the shop\u2019s vast catalogue and busy web store alongside founder Amandip \u201cMoose\u201d Singh Malhi. \u201cIt\u2019s not a perfect term, for sure,\u201d says Jeffrey, \u201cbut I think it makes sense to a lot of people, because it makes it clear you\u2019re omitting the ingredient that most people notice first.\u201d It\u2019s worth noting that Jeffrey is a practicing vegan; for him, destilado con or \u201cvegan pechuga\u201d or whatever you call it offers a layer of inclusion and accessibility in line with his own dietary practice. But for others it\u2019s a major eye roll\u2014nearly everyone I spoke to for this article expressed a level of dissatisfaction with the term. \u201cIt\u2019s not a term the mezcaleros use,\u201d says Rodriguez. \u201cIt means we don\u2019t have the language yet to describe what we have.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n
<\/p><\/div>\n The importer Justin Lane Briggs, who oversees the impressive agave roster at <\/span>Skurnik<\/span><\/a>, takes a long-view perspective on the topic. \u201cI certainly get people pushing back on the category as a whole, especially serious agave heads,\u201d he says. But \u201cwhen you say it\u2019s an agave distilled with cacao, that helps for newcomers to fit their heads around it.\u201d Skurnik brings in several extraordinary destilado con bottlings, including a wildly expressive series by the brand Salvadores, whose elote, herba santa and tamarind chile destilado con offerings are a revelation.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n
<\/p>\n Briggs pointed out that spiritually, <\/span>destilado con<\/span><\/i> is a handful of juniper berries away from being almost a kind of mezcal gin; meanwhile Fred Sanchez called out the <\/span>pulque abocado<\/span><\/a> tradition as a natural precursor to today\u2019s mezcal destilado con<\/span> trend. What you arrive at in exploring the category is a kind of collision: old ideas about distilling exciting flavors directly into stuff that\u2019s good to drink, and a newly appreciative market stateside that can\u2019t get enough of it.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n
<\/p>\n If great mezcal is like sipping a complex cocktail in spirit form, then the best destilado con bottlings argue loudly for themselves to be considered by bartenders the world over. At <\/span>Pretty Decent<\/span><\/a> in Louisville, Kentucky, co-owner John Douglass recently served a julep riff (\u201cin truth a long stretch from a julep,\u201d he says) built around the <\/span>Mal Bien Zacate Lim\u00f3n<\/span><\/a>, whose wide availability and attractive price point have helped make it one of the most popular destilado con offerings currently on the market stateside. Douglass blends green peas into the mezcal, then spins it out with a centrifuge before shaking with orgeat, lemon and a huge sprig of mint. At <\/span>Obvio<\/span><\/a> in Manahttan, a tamarind and mango destilado con by Salvadores is amplified with fresh mango, lemon and lime, while the Pal\u2019alma Caf\u00e9 De Olla release\u2014one of their earliest destilado con products, heavy and bombastic with flavors of clove, piloncillo and fresh coffee\u2014meets vanilla, clementine and mole bitters. I\u2019ve personally found that the aforementioned <\/span>Rezpiral Espadin con shuega<\/span><\/a> tastes incredible served tall and cool over stacked cubes with soda water and a grapefruit peel expression, and the Macurichos destilado con cacao acts as a delicious base for a White Russian, in place of vodka <\/span>in this recipe<\/span><\/a>. This spirit is delicious even on its own, coming on first like hot chocolate before settling into flavors of peppercorn and stone-cut oatmeal. My greatest dream is that an article like this might bloom a thousand destilado con cocktails, so that I might quaff them all.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n
<\/p>\n But there\u2019s still the matter of what to call it. \u201cPechuga is a turn of phrase we\u2019ve glommed onto, for good or bad,\u201d says Briggs of Skurnik. Some bars, like <\/span>Odin in Oakland<\/span><\/a>, list their destilado con offerings under the wider category heading of Pechuga. And some mezcal brands, like <\/span>Tlamati<\/span><\/a>, use the term \u201cPechuga\u201d as a catchall, even for mezcals made without protein: it appears on the bottle label for their <\/span>Milpa<\/span><\/a> bottling, which uses Papalom\u00e9tl agave as the base and adds to it the Mezoamerican cover crop m\u00e9lange of criollo corn, huitlacoche, squash and pipicha leaf. Some of the discrepancy in nomenclature owes to the relative newness of this product category, but it\u2019s also a matter of intrigue for the importers tasked with bringing these esoteric spirits across an international border to serve growing public interest. The vagaries of <\/span>TTB compliance<\/span><\/a> for pechuga and destilado con would make a fine article unto itself, but for drinkers with interest in exploring the product category, this is a golden moment, and there are very real people behind the explosion in availability, navigating the import statutes in real time.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n
<\/p>\n Whatever you call it\u2014\u201cdestilado con\u201d is accurate but a little clunky, \u201cvegan pechuga\u201d is effective but technically an oxymoron, and also something of a Rorschach test on one\u2019s personal feelings towards veganism in the first place\u2014I\u2019m convinced this is a uniquely compelling and delicious category of agave spirits, and indicative of the wider boomtown moment for appreciating agave in which we find ourselves.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\nFive Destillado Con Expressions to Check Out<\/b><\/h3>\n
\n<\/b>A collaboration between Puebla\u2019s Zinacantan and a vanilla farming cooperative in Veracruz, this spirit is all pie crust and white pepper, buttercream and a serious cooked agave backbone.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n
\n<\/b>This spirit has mega-mellifluous properties, like the sweetest batch of creamed corn, the most beautiful bowl of Chinese corn soup or the most delicious cup of atole.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n
\n<\/b>The gold standard for destilado con in my tasting forays, from the esteemed producer-owned mezcal brand Rey Campero in Zoquitl\u00e1n, in the southern mountains of Oaxaca. A blend of guava, apples, raisins and cinnamon, the spontaneous fermented ambient yeast Espadin used in this distillate shines through in every sip. I am carefully nursing my bottle from last year, it\u2019s just that good.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n
\n<\/b>On the savory edge of what destilado con can be, this bottling evokes campfire hot chocolate, whipped cream and Sarawak pepper. In some future Winter Wonderland I\u2019m spiking a hot chocolate with this stuff.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n
\n<\/b>I was handed this by a friend\u2014it has all the hallmarks of a secret passed note in the school hallway, or a whispered conspiracy. You can\u2019t buy it, but you can if you know where to look. It tastes like holy water: anise, Tutti Frutti Jelly Belly, sasparilla. You could sub this in for absinthe for a Death in the Afternoon or yellow Chartreuse in a Naked & Famous and not miss a trick.
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