ur Patrón Tequila story starts in an agave field in the
highlands of the central western Mexican state of Jalisco.
I’ve been invited to propagate my own agave plant. In around
seven years, the seed will be large enough to harvest and, if I’m lucky,
go into making a batch of Patrón. That’s a long time to wait for a drink.
Our next demonstration is by a jimador, a field-worker employed by
the family that owns acres of agave that go into the making of Patrón.
He cuts a mature agave plant with a tool called a coa – basically a circular
blade on a long pole – removng the leaves away to reveal the piña (or
heart) of the plant, which will offer the juice later in the distilling process.
One jimador will harvest hundreds of piñas a day from the red
volcanic soil of these highlands. There’s agave as far as the eye can see
and the hills roll with a beautiful hue of the blue weber variety, the
only plant permitted by law to be used in producing the spirit. The
jimador’s job is to scan the fields each day, measuring the sugar
concentration of each plant until it’s ready to harvest.
Back at the Patrón Hacienda, the famed home of the brand just
outside the town of Atotonilco el Alto, our tour resumes. While the
facade of the hacienda would have you believe the brand has beenaround for hundreds of years, it’s actually only existed for just over 27.
John Paul DeJoria, the brains behind the Paul Mitchell hair care range
and his friend, Martin Crowley, saw the potential in raising tequila out
from frat-boy notoriety by creating a refined brand for the burgeoning
luxury spirits sector. After teaming up with master distiller Francisco
Alcaraz, Patrón Tequila was born.
While that sounds simple, the technique is anything but and
Alcaraz has built a distillery that maintains a small-batch philosophy
while achieving global mass production. The tequila elevates to luxury
status through a double distillation process for its ‘Silver’ tequila
variety and a third distillation for Patrón ‘Platinum’.
Modern-day consumers will be pleased to know that from the start,
Patrón has championed a culture of giving back by supporting the
local community and its integrated sustainable practices. Among
them, their method of converting the agave waste to compost
that’s then returned to the farmers.
Patrón has added a lavish new accommodation precinct to the
Hacienda, named La Casona. While not open to the general public, like
the Hacienda itself, it’s the essence of luxury with 20 out-of-this-worldTAKE A TOUR THROUGH THE AGAVE FIELDS
TO DISCOVER THE HEART OF PATRÓN TEQUILA.A taste of Mexico
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WORDS NICK SMITH PHOTOGRAPHY VINCENT LONG