Tequila 'Barrancas' [Wild Mango, Mamey, and Plum]

• Tequila produced at Cava de Oro (NOM 1477) in Amatitán, Jalisco (Los Valles)
• Maestro Tequilero Alberto Partida
• 100% Azul aka Blue Weber (Agave tequilana)
• Single estate agave harvested from the El Tepehuaje field at 6 years old
• Cooked in a traditional mesquite-wood-fired stone oven (without steam)
• Milled using an automated tahona (traditional stone wheel mill)
• Fermented with fibers (bagasse) in open-air wood tanks (tinas) using spring water and ambient yeast
• Twice distilled in historical, original copper pot stills; wild mango, plum, and mamey added on the second distillation
• Rested over one year in glass before bottling
• The alcohol’s heat is subtle, offering notes of coriander, candied apple, roasted carrot, mango skin, underripe plum, paw paw, nutmeg, burnt lemon, mesquite, and roasted pear
• 2200 bottles produced
• 55% ABV

“Imagine 80 years ago, there were not many tequila consumers—it wasn’t too important in the city, in Guadalajara. The main business for our family was selling our fruit,” maestro tequilero Alberto Partida explains. After blights ravaged the region’s agriculture in the 1970s, the strongest fruits survived and dominated: mango, mamey, and plum. And as tequila grew exponentially, remaining family farmlands were widely converted to agave, or sold to larger scale plantations. Today, Alberto’s uncle continues to tend the orchards, inspiring Alberto to explore more deeply this vanishing aspect of his family heritage.

In a process reminiscent of both the “pechuga” tradition in mezcal, and the “ponche” tradition of fruit-steeped spirits most popular around the winter holidays, Alberto has combined the bounty of his home and the Partida family’s agricultural legacy—mango, plum, mamey, and agave—in one bottle.

In May, fruits from the season’s harvest are selected and prepared before eventually being added to the second pass of Alberto’s blanco tequila in his small wood-fired copper pot stills. The resulting spirit is then rested in small glass damajuanas (demijohns) for a full year. Proofed to an envelope-pushing, full-spectrum 55% ABV, Amatitena Barrancas Tequila is one of the most exciting and hotly anticipated (and limited!) new releases from Mexico in 2024.