Para todo mal mezsal,
y para todo bien tambien
Mezcal cures every sadness,
And the holiday wouldn’t be the same without him
Ostap Bender believed that it was possible to distill vodka from anything, even from a stool. He was not far from the truth. If, according to the great schemer, only “some prefer stool”, then the number of lovers of a strong agave drink is much greater: all the hardworking Mexican people revere mezcal as much as the hardworking Russian people respect their “villain with a sticker.” Evidence of this is the folk wisdom given in the epigraph to which I tried to reproduce in Russian.
However, before starting to talk about this unusual drink, one philological remark needs to be made. Both in Russian and in English (Mescal), its name, unfortunately, is written in exactly the same way as the name of the cactus (aka peyfroml), from which the famous hallucinogen mescaline is extracted. These two mezcals «are not even namesakes». In Spanish in Mexico they are written differently: mezcal (drink) and Mescal (cactus that supplies drugs). So don't be confused please.
Narcfromiki — it's not for us. We travel with a good old bottle.
Among the many ruins of ancient Indian cities in Mexico, there are famous ones like Chichen Itza or Uxmal, where a well-functioning tourist industry flourishes, but there are also those that not every guest of the state gets to. Among the latter, unfortunately, is Mitla, one of the attractions of the province of Oaxaca, adjacent to the Pacific Ocean.
On the way to Mitla
Mitla, a city of the Mixtec Indian tribe, flourished from the 10th century until the Spanish invasion. Of course, the ruins of Mitla are inferior to Chichen Itza in magnificence. There are no famous step pyramids here, but Mitla is the only city in Mexico where builders decorated buildings with elegant geometric patterns. The magnificent, varied mosaic panels that to this day cover the walls of palaces, temples, and tombs give these ancient ruins an amazing charm.
Therefore, if you have already reached Oaxaca and the sun is not too merciless, it is time to set aside a day and take a rattling regular bus from to Mitla. The trip will take a little less than an hour and a half, and finally the bus will turn off the highway onto a small road that will lead you to today's Mitla — either a village or a small, clean village.
First, in the square near the bus station, you will need to fight a noisy crowd of women and girls, who will vying with each other to offer all sorts of goods, and above all homemade rag dolls, a folk craft of Mitla. Having bought one and shielding yourself from the rest of the merchants with it, like a shield, you have the opportunity to finally set foot on the main street of Mitla, which leads straight to the ruins.
You will have to walk along it for about one and a half kilometers, and if you are walking with your wife, then you still need to overcome the temptation to look into each of the numerous shops and shops, where in incredible quantities hang roughly sewn, but bright and very attractive dresses, sweaters and capes, worn by local fashionistas.
As a matter of fact, almost half of the houses on the main street of Mitla are made up of such shops. Second half — these are equally numerous expendios de mezcal, (mescals). It is better to visit them on the way back in order to keep a fresh mind for exploring the ancient ruins. That's what we did.
Worm in a bottle
In one of the guidebooks I bought in Munich, I read that “the taste of mezcal for a European is absolutely terrible.” I don’t know whether Russian people really are not completely European, or whether the author of the guidebook was a teetotaler, but his judgment seemed to us completely untenable. We visited several expendios de mezcal one after another and in each one the kind owner invited us to try his product: I — a stronger variety (43 degrees), for my wife — weaker (38). We found the drink not only not terrible, but very pleasant. Mezcal is essentially a kind of vodka distilled from agave, and the vodka is not bad at all. Mezcal has the option of being either completely colorless or a light amber color. It has a peculiar fresh aroma and taste, slightly grassy, contrasting with a more «plfrom» bread spirit of grain vodka. However, there are many mezcals, like vodkas, and they vary in taste. Mezcal is distilled at local distilleries almost throughout Mexico. With some exceptions, which will be discussed later, they consume it right on the spot and do not take it out. There are no standards for these types of mezcal, so it may be that the author of the guidebook was simply unlucky.
Mezcal from Mitla is one of the exceptions; it is the only mezcal that is exported under its own name. It is sometimes possible to buy it in Europe, however, you have to look hard for this: they don’t sell mezcal in supermarkets, and not in every specialized wine store either.
I think that mezcal from Mitla owes its relative popularity not so much to its quality as to its unusual bottling. In each bottle of this mezcal, at the bottom there is a worm preserved in alcohol, or rather a caterpillar that lives in the juicy pulp of the agave. Such a worm — a kind of «quality mark» mezcal from Mitla, certifying its authenticity. Live the worm is reddish in color, but in alcohol it quickly discolors. In large bottles the worm is thick and long or two medium-sized, in small «bastards» — correspondingly small. A cloth bag of salt is suspended from the neck of each bottle with a worm. This kind of salt is used to lick mezcal, which, of course, is much more interesting and pleasant than snorting vodka with cloth. This salt is brown-red in color, because it is mixed with well-dried and powdered agave worms. A pinch of salt is poured onto the back of the hand moistened with saliva and, after knocking over the glass, it is quickly licked off. I must admit that the combination of the taste of mezcal and such salt is really not bad at all. Satisfied with the tasting, we immediately grabbed a bottle. In another mezcal shop we again tasted and bought several small — for friends. And in another… The stickers were different, but all were bright, roughly colored in the characteristic style of Mexican kitsch, with agaves, Mexicans in wide-brimmed sombreros and, of course, all with the same twisted red worms.
It must be said that initially mezcal was bottled in Mitla, and even now it is sometimes bottled not in bottles, but in squat black clay pots. But we preferred bottles, because in them the worm is immediately visible and during the treat you can watch the expression on your friends’ faces.
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Spaniards love to drink
Before the Spanish conquest, the Mexican Indians did not know strong drinks. Until 1521 they were exclusively pulque — Milky-colored, slightly foamy and viscous fermented agave juice, although not the type of agave that goes into mezcal. Pulque is no stronger than weak beer. It is still produced in abundance and drunk from Mexicans. The appearance of aguardiente ("fire water") together with the Europeans had the same destructive effect on the Mexican Indians as on the Indians of North America or on our peoples of Siberia.
Unlike the Indians, the Spaniards, and even more so, the Spanish soldiers, loved to drink. The small amount of intoxicating drink that they brought with them to the New World was soon drunk. It was necessary to look for a suitable replacement. The Spaniards built primitive distillation installations within a few months of their arrival in Mexico. It was just a matter of raw materials. The Spaniards naturally paid attention to the existence of pulque. Soon, after a series of experiments, it was discovered that much stronger drinks can be distilled from other types of agave. This is where the history of mezcal began.
It is curious that for some reason the Spaniards ignored corn, even though it was in abundance: after all, corn comes from Mexico. Otherwise, the birthplace of bourbon whiskey would certainly have been one of the Mexican states, and not the American Kentucky. In Mexico, in addition, the crops of sugar cane and grapes quickly appeared, however, their cultivation and processing by the Crown was not encouraged, so that the colony would not pose a dangerous competition to the metropolis.
Soon, the interrupted ties with distant Spain were restored, and most of the colonists returned to their usual wine, brandy and rum. But by that time, the Spaniards had already realized what commercial benefits the sale of strong drinks to the Indians promised them, the addiction to which had already entered the blood of the local population 20 years after the Spanish conquest.
Since then, throughout the colonial period, the authorities either allowed the production of mezcal, imposing heavy taxes on it, or prohibited it when widespread drunkenness led to disruption of order and economic breakdown. It should be noted, however, that the periods of prohibition were always short, and the periods of permission became longer and longer.
Mezcal recipe
Quite often you can read in various kinds of guides for bartenders that mezcal is obtained by distilling pulque. This is not true. This misconception was apparently started by the famous German naturalist Alexander von Humboldt, in his “Political Treatise on the Kingdom of New Spain.” (1803) who described the clandestine production of mezcal. In fact, the only thing pulque and mezcal have in common is that both are made from agave.
True, from different types of agave. Mezcal uses smaller types of agave than pulque, about a third smaller in diameter. People call this agave mezcal azul, blue mescal. This agave has straight, narrow, sharp leaves covered with a bluish coating. Agave is harvested when the plant is ready to flower. This doesn't happen every year. Agave that produces pulque blooms every 10-12 years, agave that produces mezcal — every 8-12 years. This rarity of flowering is generally characteristic of agaves: it is not for nothing that miniature agaves, which we grow in flower pots, are popularly called agave (he should be warned right away: you can’t make either pulque or mezcal from our agave).
Before flowering, a significant amount of sweetish juice accumulates in the agave, called aguamiel, honey water. This from juice becomes from mezcal — each plant produces three — four liters. Using a special tool, the soa, the workers-pickers cut the agave from the root, chop off the sharp leaves, leaving the core, also known as pina (in other words, a pineapple, which it looks like). Such a core weighs from 40 to 80 kilograms.
Now, of course, the production of fire water has been put on an industrial basis. But this is now, and at the beginning of the century everything was going the old fashioned way. The core was cut in half and the chopped pieces were transported by mules from the plantation to the city. At the distillery, wide pits about one and a half meters deep are prepared in advance. At the bottom of them there is a hot fire from mesquite wood. Large stones were glowing in the fire. Pieces of agave were placed on top of coals and hot stones until a small mound was formed, which was then covered with grass and then with earth. After this, the raw materials were left to simmer in the heat.
There was another way: pieces of the core were placed in a hole, covered with succulent agave leaves, and the fire was lit on top.
When, after a few days, such an earthen oven was opened, a brownish, smoking mass was discovered, in which all the juice had turned into sugar. The hot mass was transferred to another pit, lined with stones, at the bottom of which a heavy millstone driven by mules rotated.
The Indians carried the semi-liquid gruel ground with millstones on their heads in deep vessels and poured them into large barrels, where they were left for fermentation. The fermented mass then entered primitive distillation apparatuses, which finally produced the long-awaited mezcal.
Today, of course, the technology for producing mezcal has been modernized, and instead of pits and millstones, autoclaves, mills, and factory stills are used. However, in the outback they still drive for their own needs the old fashioned way.
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Tequila — mezcal that has become popular
But there is one variety of mezcal that has become widely known and even conquered the world market. Now in almost every good European store you can buy a bottle of a Mexican drink called tequila. Moreover, tequila has become an essential part of many popular cocktails.
Meanwhile, few people know that tequila — This is the same mezcal that is distilled from the Agave tequilana agave plant, which grows mainly in the Mexican state of Jalisco. Both agave and the drink got their name from the city of Tequila, the main center for the production of this variety of mezcal.
It was mezcal from this city that became an export product for the first time in the history of Mexico, when in 1873 several barrels of it were sent to the United States. Then it was not yet called tequila, and even at the World's Fair in Chicago in 1893, where it received a medal, it was still presented as “brandy mezcal.” It was not until 1910 that the San Antonio Fair medal was awarded to “tequila wine.” The name of the city has since become the name of the drink.
Agave tequilana is grown primarily in two areas: around the city of Tequila and around Tepatitlan. In total, about 60 million plants are cultivated on an area of 20 thousand hectares. This «blue agave» ripens for flowering faster than other varieties: once every 8-10 years.
The production process for tequila is basically the same as for any mezcal. Perhaps the only difference that distinguishes it is that sugar is added to natural aguamiel, agave juice, in a ratio of 1:8 by weight. Fermentation of the mixture lasts four days, after which it goes for distillation. But the final product is obtained only after the second distillation.
Most of the tequila, at this moment colorless as a tear, is immediately bottled. The smaller one remains in oak barrels for aging from a few months to a maximum of seven years. At the same time, the drink softens and acquires a pale straw color. A very small part of tequila is used to prepare liqueurs based on it: almond, cream or quince.
There are now 30 distilleries producing tequila in the state of Jalisco, with the 13 largest accounting for more than 90 percent of all production. The tequila industry feeds about 120,000 people in the state.
Now about 70 million liters of tequila are produced annually, half of which are exported. The Mexican government is exempting tequila producers from licensing and export duties in order to promote the national drink on the world market at a reasonable price.
At the same time, Europe drinks only 5 percent of the total amount exported, and the United States — more than 90. However, European tequila is of higher quality, because it is always real tequila bottled at the production site with a strength of 38 to 43 degrees.
As for the USA and Canada, tequila is distilled there in steel tanks, and the drink itself is produced at an increased strength — 55 degrees. Already on site, the importer dilutes it with distilled water, bringing it to normal strength, and bottles it. Which, of course, is not at all like a natural product.
By the way, useful information for those who read the stickers on American bottles of alcohol: if you see that some drink has a strength of 80 degrees, do not believe your eyes. The American degree corresponds to only 0.5 percent alcohol content. So behind the terrible figure lies only our sign May — forty degrees.
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The most important thing: how they drink it
Connoisseurs drink both mezcal and tequila exclusively in their pure form. After a glass, a pinch of salt is required. If you drink not in Mitla, where the salt, as I already said, is very special, then it will be salt mixed with pepper and other spices. Instead of salt, you are allowed to suck on a slice of lemon, or rather lime, a small green lemon, popular in Mexico, and not only there. Very gourmets preface their drink with lemon and finish it with salt.
If you are not a connoisseur, but an ordinary consumer, then wash down mezcal and tequila with «sangrita» (» blood), which is based on tomato and orange juices, onions and incredibly hot Mexican chili peppers. Having grabbed a glass of such a mixture, you are able to immediately ask yourself an academic question: what was worse than mezcal itself or sangrita? One of the most popular varieties of sangrita is called la viuda («widow»). I don’t presume to say why her husband died.
Tequila (but never mezcal) is also drunk in the form of all kinds of cocktails and mixtures. The Russian ear will be interested to hear about the drink submarino («submarine»): a glass of tequila is poured into a mug of beer — familiar, isn't it? Others drink tequila with anise on ice, with grapefruit juice, pomegranate juice and grated pecans, sometimes simply diluted with soda or lemonade.
It's whoever wants it. But a true masterpiece, created on the basis of tequila, — This is a margarita cocktail. He has long since gained worldwide fame, far beyond the borders of Mexico.
Recipe for «Margarita» simple: 4 parts tequila, 1 part orange liqueur (triple sec is best, but Cointreau is also acceptable), a slice of lemon or half a lime — all this, of course, on ice. But for «margarita» The shape of the glass is no less important. Its edges are moistened with lemon and immersed in fine crystalline salt. As a result, the glass turns out to be covered around the edge with salty “frost”, which must be sipped with every sip.
The effect is indescribable! And from me today «margarita» You can order it in any European bar, but I can still testify: in her homeland she drank in a special way, especially when guitars were thundering next to the table and the voices of mariachi were flowing. After the third or fourth serving we usually lost count…
End of topic
A thick worm at the bottom of a bottle of mezcal «Gusano rojo» («Red Worm») was accepted by part of the editorial board stoically, as befits true Russians.
Author: Kronid Lyubarsky