Biquix - San Jose del Peñasco

Batch: RB-01

Release date: October 2024

main image for the Biquix - San Jose del Peñasco mezcal in the mezcal library
main image for the Biquix - San Jose del Peñasco mezcal in the mezcal library

At a glance:

  • Maguey: Biquix (A. Karwinski)
  • Producer: Román Bautista
  • Region: San Jose del Peñasco, Miahuatlán, Oaxaca
  • Cooking: Classic in-earth horno
  • Milling: Machete & Shredder
  • Fermentation: 5-6 days in wooden tina with well water
  • Distillation: Double pass in copper alembic
  • Batch size: 85 litres
  • Date of production: December 2021
  • ABV: 45.9%

As you drive west out of the town of Miahuatlán de Porfirio Díaz, you’re soon faced with a choice of left of right.

Left leads to San Luis Amatlán (a community Sin Gusano customers will be familiar with from previous bottlings) and Logoche (a community you may associate with the brand Neta). Right is the path far less travelled.

It’s down that right hand turn in 2021 that we first met with Román, at his single-still family palenque.

Young Cuishe growing wild

Young Cuishe growing wild

In the hills of Miahuatlán

In the hills of Miahuatlán

Harvested biquix waiting to roast

Cuishe (on the left) waiting to roast

Biquix - also known locally as Cuishe, and in Santa Caterina minas and Ejutla as Tobaziche - grows tall and skinny, with the sugar-rich piña of the plant often only at the top of what otherwise just looks like a tree trunk.

Broadly speaking this means distilled Cuishe can be less sweet (and arguably more complex) than spirits made from its fatter cousins like the Madrecuishe and Barril. It tends to offer quite woody flavours.

The Bautista family painenque

The Bautista family painenque

Roman's dad, still working

Roman's dad, still working

All of Romans agave are foraged from the wild. In this case the biquix plants were harvested from a hill-top area late in 2021.

The agave were roasted immediately in the small traditional horno, before being cut to size by machete and fed through a wood chipper.

Cuishe (on the left) waiting to roast

Harvested biquix waiting to roast

Fields of coriander & garlic

Fields of coriander & garlic

Crops grown by the family

Crops grown by the family

A 5 day fermentation with well water followed before the agave were ultimately double passed through the palenque’s single copper alembic still.

This batch totalled 85 litres. With 15-20 already sold locally, we snapped up the remaining litres while we had the chance.

Roman creator of the Biquix - San Jose del Peñasco mezcal

Gracias Roman

House Tasting Notes:

Nose: Incredibly vegetal. Like raw root vegetables and freshly dug and chopped potato, but with a background sweetness of fresh split resinous wood.

Palate: On first sip those vegetal, woody, and sweet tones combine in amazing harmony to create this absolute treat of a mezcal. No smoke to speak of, just wonderfully mineral and vegetal Miahuatlán biquix in a glass.

Finish: There’s something almost unreal about the finish on this one. Slate and stone blend with the extreme vegetal notes and kick out a kind of pick’n’mix sweetness.

a bottle of the Biquix mezcal bottled for the Sin Gusano project

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