Get the retro-Martini and coupe glasses ready. Prep those cucumber ribbons and lime wheels. You are about to enter Blue Weber heaven.
Brace yourself for Bee-ritas and Neuritas. As well as a Tommy or two. And eight days of straining and shaking.
From 18th to 26th February, the UK’s inaugural Margarita Week will feature nationwide “Master Your Margarita” masterclasses, events, tastings, partnerships, promotions and Tajin-rimming workshops across the UK.
Cazcabel has teamed up with venues across the country to create tequila experiences. New and old.
Participating venues include Callooh Callay and Murder Inc in London; Science + Industry and El Capo in Manchester; Butter and Pins in Liverpool; and Leave Me Alone and Lisa and Hibou in Newcastle.
Bar groups across the country including Stack, Akito, and Head of Steam will be hosting their own dedicated Margarita menus.
In London, Mestizo Chelsea will debut a new Margarita menu; and Bao Shoreditch will be running a Hot Man Margarita special, as well as launching a ‘Margarita robot’ – a AI mixologist.
Leicester venue 33 Cank Street is organising a 24-hour ‘Marg-a-thon’ for charity, while Home Bar will be kicking off its Fastest Margarita in the East competition. Only those with PBs (personal bests) of sub 28 seconds need apply.
Recently named the UK’s bestselling 100 percent agave tequila, Cazcabel was voted Master in this year’s Tequila & Mezcal Master Awards.
100 percent Agave Cazcabel Blanco muddled with lime juice and agave syrup to make a Tommy Margarita. It was created around 1987 by Julio Bermejo and named after his family’s Mexican restaurant bar “Tommy’s” in San Francisco.
It promises to be a week of serious muddling and experimenting. New honey aperitif Beesou makes a Bee-Garita.
Lux tequilas makes lux Margaritas.
Patron has just released “El Alto” which is recommended to be served in a Champagne flute.
Maestro tequilero David Rodriguez’s team “endured” more than 300 tastings to refine the blend of tequilas aged in eleven different kinds of hybrid barrels. That means El Alto is technically a relatively young reposado tequila, even though most of the blend is extra añejo, aged more than three years.
Tom Miller, Commercial Director at Amathus, which has an impressive portfolio of high-priced Tequilas, commented:
“Luxury Tequila has to be one of the most exciting and unique categories at the moment and we are seeing three players come out on top. in this category. Two established brands, Don Julio 1942 and Clase Azul, and the newcomer, Tequila Komos.”
Clase Azul Reposado is aged for at least 8 months, bottled in a beautiful, hand-painted Talavera carafe.
Tequila Komos is produced from a blanco base using agave from the highlands and lowlands of Tequila. The blanco is then roasted in traditional volcanic stone ovens and the juice fermented with native yeast and then double distilled in pot stills.
Other ultra-luxury, collectors’ tequilas include ReySol Anejo ($300), Gran Patron Burdeos ($500) and Asombroso Del Porto Extra Anejo ($1,500).
Aman Spirits is said to be the ‘first and only’ operating Tequila distillery to be built in the state of Nayarit, Mexico, despite being one of five states that are part of the Denomination of Origin for Tequila.
The Aman Tequila portfolio has been crafted by master distiller Hector Dávalos. The añejo expression, known as ‘El Profesor’, wom gold at the 2022 Luxury masters blind tasting.
The rhomboidal geometric pattern and structure alludes to traditional Mexican and Aztec historic artifacts, which feature similar geometry to the pointed leaves of agave plants. The innovative metallic gradient – the ‘first of its kind’ on the market – reveals the liquid and glass on the wide side of the bottle. Aman costs between $58.60 to $165.30.
Tequila is not quite the new Rolex. Although Tequila Ley offers a $3.5 million bottle made with over four 4 pounds of platinum.
Cazcabel remains the everyday entry-point, all- purpose tequila cocktail to toast the jimadors, tahona millers, macerators, fermenters, distillers and bottlers of Mexico. Not just in Jalisco.
But don’t forget the Tabasco. Or Empresas Tajin. Or Mama Necha.
Created by Horatio Fernandez in 1985 after his grandmother’s recipe, the de-hydrated chilli and lime condiment is named after a pre-Columbian archaeological site in the state of Vera Cruz.
One day there will be a National Tajin Day.
Author Bio:
Kevin Pilley is a former professional cricketer and chief staff writer of PUNCH magazine. His humour, travel, food and drink work appears worldwide and he has been published in over 800 titles.
Photographs courtesy of Cazcabel
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