Madre Mezcal Ensamble

Madre Mezcal Ensamble is an Oaxacan mezcal blending cultivated Espadin with rare wild Cuishe agave.

Most of the blend is made by Jose Ines Garcia Morales and his family at their palenque in San Dionisio, with a portion of Cuishe coming from the Vazquez family in Miahuatlan. Cuishe belongs to the slow-ripening Karwinskii group, alongside Cirial and Tobasiche, and accounts for only one or two per cent of the agave used for mezcal. Its pina is long and thin, and unusually the stalk is harvested and roasted along with it, part of why Karwinskii mezcals carry such firm structure. Wild agave is a finite thing, so Madre puts two plants back for every one cut. Each small batch goes into recycled glass and is numbered by hand.

Sweet roasted agave from the Espadin, herbal and faintly tropical lift from the Cuishe, and smoke that stays in the background. Sip it neat at room temperature from a copita, or build it into a negroni or a paloma where the earthiness holds up against bitterness and citrus.