WHEN checking into one of Mexico City’s Grupo Habita hotels, you might notice a large, squarish bottle of mezcal sitting on the counter. Rafael Micha, one of the hotel’s four partners, is a big fan — the mod hotel chain has begun bottling its own version, which is sold exclusively to guests.
Tequila’s long-lost uncle, mezcal, is experiencing a wave of popularity in Mexico’s mile-high capital. Chilangos, Distrito Federal residents, are consuming the spirit in record numbers and mezcalerias, tiny bars that specialize in serving the spirit once reserved for working-class Mexicans, are opening left and right.
The word mezcal comes from the native Central Mexican Náhuatl language and means “cooked agave.” Like champagne and bourbon, mezcal is a beverage protected by International Denomination of Origin. Tequila is a mezcal. It is to mezcal what scotch is to whiskey, and made exclusively from the agave azul plants in the state of Jalisco. But there are 200 species of agave, 30 of which are used to make mezcal.
The agave comes from the regions of Durango, Guanajuato, Guerrero, Oaxaca, San Luis Potosí, Tamaulipas and Zacatecas. Dozens of new mezcal production plants have opened since 2005 and several more are being built today. Oaxaca, the birthplace of mezcal, has invested $1 million in promoting it, and the Consejo Mexicano Regulador de la Calidad del Mezcal (Mexican Mezcal Quality Regulatory Council) says that Mexico has 330,000 hectares being harvested, belonging to some 9,000 producers. National certified mezcal production is higher than 2 million liters, out of which 434,000 are exported, suggesting the spirit has tracked with visitors.
But the city’s mezcalerias are where this trend is best witnessed. There’s a chic apothecary décor at the DF’s biggest mezcaleria chain, La Botica. It was started by Cesar González Hermosillo, and expanded into six locations, with newer branches in San Miguel de Allende, Leon, Playa del Carmen, and Madrid — the first branch outside Mexico. The vibrant Condesa location — where small botanas (bar snacks) like chappolenes (grasshoppers) and haba (large beans dusted with chile powder) are served to a hip, urban crowd — is the favored locale.
Outside, smokers gather to exchange gossip under the jacaranda trees. Inside, many young women sip on cremas de agave, (a creamy and softer mezcal liquor including flavors like cajeta cream, coco, and Jamaica). The men on the other hand tend to favor more abrasive mezcals like blancos, (clear and aged in steel or glass) smoky anejos, (amber and aged in barrels) and pechuga, (a curious concoction made with a turkey or chicken breast marinated in the mezcal barrel during the fermentation process).
In student-heavy Coyoacan, Oh Mayahuel is another hot new mezcaleria, with volcanic stone floors and a wall of hand-blown mezcal bottles dividing the restaurant from the bar. An outdoor patio area faces the Jardin, and is separated from the sidewalk by rows of potted agave. It swells with mezcal drinkers in the evenings and is located on the trendy north side of the Jardin Centenario, a tidy, green zocalo adjacent to the main plaza of Coyoacan noteworthy because Frida Kahlo, Diego Rivera and Leon Trotsky all lived in the neighborhood, and their homes have been converted into museums now frequented by visitors and scholars.
Last summer saw the arrival of yet another mezcaleria in the leafy Roma neighborhood. Housed on the first two floors of an old Beaux-Arts mansion, Red Fly features walls bathed in papaya green and offers one of the city’s largest selections of mezcals — 90-plus varieties, including organic artisanal varieties from producers like Don Eduardo Angeles of Real Minero, and Alpius Blancos, single-village mezcals which help support economies of rural communities. Red Fly’s proprietor, Chef Canek Sousa is a stout, soft-spoken man with a rock ‘n’ roll style and all the markings of a person who knows and loves food. He’s always at the bar and, like many, is endlessly interested in how food and mezcal mix.
“In the last two years, I’ve seen the mezcal trend expand, but important chefs have also started paying attention to mezcal,” says Héctor Vazquez, a master mezcalero from Los Danzantes, a restaurant in Oaxaca which is widely credited as a pioneer of mezcal’s renaissance.
“There are no sommeliers specializing in mezcal,” continues Vazquez. “I could tell you that I’m one, that it’s part of my job, but I don’t really like to make fancy shows and pour mezcal as a sophisticated thing. I know there are other good chefs like Monica Patino, Benito Molina, Patricia Quintana, Ricardo Munoz Zurita, Ruben Amador, and some others very interested in mezcal, and trying to go deep with it.”
There’s a saying in Mexico — “conéctelo.” (Connect it.) It’s their version of “hair of the dog that bit you,” meaning when you’re hung-over, treat the pain with more alcohol. Curiously, mezcal — which can exceed 140 proof — has no hangover effects, which could explain its popularity.
Vázquez has a more Mexican, and perhaps simpler, explanation.
“Someone taught me that the best mezcal you can have, is the one that you have in front of you — the one that you are already sipping and enjoying.”
WHERE TO DRINK
1) Oh Mayahuel – Plaza Jardin Centenario 9A, +52 55-5554-7555; ohmayahuel.com
2) La Botica – Locations at labotica.com.mx
3) Red Fly – Orizaba 145, +52 55-5264-6339