Raicilla Costa 2023

Batch: J-PJ-01

Release date: August 2024

At a glance:

  • Maguey: Cenizo (A. Rhodacantha), Verde (A. Angustifolia), Amarillo (A. Angustifolia)
  • Producer: Pedro Joya
  • Region: Mal Paso, Cabo Corrientes, Jalisco
  • Cooking: 1 week in deep stone-lined pit
  • Milling: Hand mashed with wooden mallets in dugout canoe
  • Fermentation: 20 days with spring water in plastic 'rotoplas' drums
  • Distillation: Filipino style, in-still capture. Bonete wood condensing chamber and copper lid
  • Batch size: Captured in 19 litres glass garaffones. Roughly 1 litre per 10kg of agave
  • Date of production: Summer 2022
  • ABV: 48.1%

Travelling as far north as the road goes in the coastal Cabo Corrientes region of Jalisco, you arrive at Mal Paso. Here Pedro Joya has relatively recently picked up the baton from his father Hildegardo, and crafts tiny batch agave spirits in traditional style.

This part of Jalisco is something of a paradise, with tropical fruits growing all around. The hills just inland from Mal Paso offer magueys Cenizo (A. Rhodacantha), Verde (A. Angustifolia), and Amarillo (A. Angustifolia). While they are all quite distinct to look at, they are almost always roasted, fermented, and distilled together as an ensemble, and they are all referred to locally simply as ‘raicilla’.

  • Tropical fruit stalls on the road

    Tropical fruit stalls on the road

  • While they are all quite distinct to look at, they are almost always roasted, fermented, and distilled together as an ensemble, and they are all referred to locally simply as ‘raicilla

This summer 2022 production is one such ensemble. A roughly even mix of the three agaves was loaded into the particularly deep stone-lined horno over a fire built with local oak for a week-long roast. The roasted maguey was then milled by hand in a dugout canoa using hand carved wooden mallets.

  • Agave arriving at the Vinata ready to make some mezcal

    Agave arriving at the Vinata

  • Pedro’s deep oven for cooking pinas for mezcal

    Pedro’s deep oven

  • Agave waiting for the oven to make mezcal

    Agave waiting for the oven

That sweet, mashed syrup and fibre was then loaded into a plastic rotoplas – they type seen on the roofs of budling’s all over Mexico – along with local spring water and left to naturally ferment for a particularly lengthy 20-day period.

  • Mashing malts for mezcal

    Mashing malts

  • Stones keep the ferment down

    Stones keep the ferment down

Once fully fermented, the alcoholic mash was double distilled in this filipino set-up that’s unique to the Jalisco coast. A piece of hollowed out trunk from the bonete tree sits atop a copper boiling pot. The vapours condense on the underside of the copper lid, captured in-still by a suspended spoon that runs the distillate out of the tree trunk via a tightly bound agave leaf.

  • Once fully fermented, the alcoholic mash was double distilled in this filipino set-up that’s unique to the Jalisco coast.
  • The vapours condense on the underside of the copper lid, captured in-still by a suspended spoon that runs the distillate out of the tree trunk via a tightly bound agave leaf.

Multicolumn

Multicolumn

Jon Darby from the Sin Gusano project with Pedro from Raicilla Costa 2023

Gracias Pedro

House Tasting Notes:

Nose: Pine, brine, cheese.

Palate: Wow, the first sip is a huge palate filling delight. Elote (BBQ sweetcorn) with all the butter and cheese, overlaid with tropical fruits. It seems to get thicker in the glass and becomes a wonderful blend of fruity and woody sweetness mixed with strong lactic and cheesy tones.

Finish: Sadly, in the end, it does. But not before leaving tickles of charred pine that fade into mellow cooked agave.

Racilla Costa 2023 bottle for the Sin Gusano project

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