Tobala - Amatlán

Batch: NGG-18

Release date: February 2026

At a glance:

  • Maguey: Tobala (A. Pototorum)
  • Producer: Nicolas Garcia Gutierrez
  • Region: San Luis Amatlán, Miahuatlán District, Oaxaca
  • Cooking: Classic in-earth horno, 2-week roast
  • Milling: Machete & Shredder
  • Fermentation: Slatted wooden tinas, with well water
  • Distillation: Double pass in copper alembic
  • Batch size: 72 litres
  • Date of production: November 2022
  • ABV: 48.2%

In San Luis Amatlán, in the Miahuatlán district of southern Oaxaca, you’ll find Nicolas Garcia Gutierrez and family making exceptional agave spirits.

Nicolas’ 100% Tobala has become almost staple to the Sin Gusano range. But each batch is very small (around 70 litres) and special there remain remarkable nuances between vintages. You can taste a September 2021 distillation here.

Nicolas makes true community spirits. While cultivating various species of agave in his own nursery and land, he also has arrangements with family and friends in neighbouring communities to exchange wild agave for finished mezcal.

When it’s time do the heavy manual labour of building the oven with wood and rocks, and then covering it with the agave, the community comes to help and receives a hearty breakfast when it’s done.

Group of people standing around an outdoor oven of rocks in an outdoor setting with trees and mountains in the background.

Pre-dawn, waiting for the rocks in the horno to heat

People working with large agave plants covering an oven for the agave to cook and make mezcal outside

Community oven covering at sunrise

Group of people working outdoors with tools and equipment on a sunny day on a mezcal distillery

Almost breakfast time

The maguey plants here are always co-roasted with whatever varieties are ready for harvest at the time. After the roast, individual plans will be selected for fermenting together.

The milled roasted agave was then left in large open air wooden tubs, or ‘tinas’, with the addition of local well water, to interact with the airborne yeasts and naturally ferment for nearly 2 weeks.

using machetes to cut up the agave ready to make the mezcal

Machete work

Agave chunks ready for the shredder to make Mezcal

Agave chunks ready for the shredder

The milled roasted agave was then left in large open air wooden tubs, or ‘tinas’, with the addition of local well water, to interact with the airborne yeasts and naturally ferment for around 6 days.

Then the sour fermented mash, at this point around 10% alcohol, was loaded bit-by-bit into the boiling chamber of the still. It will take multiple fills of the still to use all the mash in the fermentation tub. And Nicholas employs a very old school technique of adding a little of the first pass, or ‘ordinario’ distillate back into the boiling chamber with each new fill of ferment.

Everything in this batch was ultimately at least double passed (some triple, when you take into account that old-school technique). After the second distillation the batch was proofed with puntas and colas (heads and tails).

Two men working with large barrels in an outdoor setting to make Mezcal for the Sin Gusano project
Man in a cowboy hat using a large metal container to handle all the fibre goes in the still for the first pass

All the fibre goes in the still for the first pass

Swapping out the mash for the Tobala - Amatlán, Batch: NGG-10 exclusive to Sin Gusano

Swapping out the mash

Nicolas, creator of the Tobala - Amatlán using a green funnel to transfer mezcal from a large container into a smaller one in a room.

Gracias Nicolas

House Tasting Notes:

Nose: Wet wild flowers during on slate. Unmistakable Amatlán mineral notes.

Palate: Wet stone continues into the first sip, but it quickly becomes more leathery in the mid-palate, eventually opening to cacau and ground coffee.

Finish: This one really rewards a little aeration in the glass. After a few minutes those richer leather and coffee notes become more prominent, with musty and heavily mineral forest floor coming into the back end.

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