People at the Core
From The Greenpoint Palace bar in Brooklyn, New York writers and bartenders, Rita and Marisa, have intimate conversations with an eclectic mix of people from all walks of life about their passions, paranoia and perspectives. Featured guests could be artists or authors, exterminators or private investigators, or the person sitting next to you at the bar.
People at the Core
One Badass Babe: Julia Cuthbertson on How Teaching in Spain and Crashing a Wedding in Mexico Led to a Love Affair with Mezcal and the Birth of Las Chingonas Imports
A wedding in Oaxaca. A chance meeting. A suitcase full of small-batch bottles that turned into an import company with a mission. We sit down with Julia Cuthbertson—founder of Las Chingonas Imports—to unpack how real mezcal is made, why labels can mislead, and what it takes to keep agave traditions alive without romanticizing them to extinction. Julia’s path winds from Connecticut and Spain to Brooklyn, where late nights at a mezcaleria and home tastings evolved into trusted relationships with families in Guerrero, Oaxaca, Puebla, and Nuevo León. She explains the messy truth behind certification and denominations of origin, why many ethical producers choose the “agave spirits” label, and how corruption, cost, and geography shape what ends up on US shelves. We go deep on sustainability: thirty-year tepextate, deforestation, water scarcity, and viveros that replant seedlings back into the hills. The conversation gets candid about adulteration, lawsuits, and the “tequilaization” of mezcal—plus the quiet, practical steps small producers take to protect species, like semi-cultivating wild pups on rocky home plots. Along the way, we taste what makes this world so vivid: clay-pot distilled tepextate from Santa Catarina Minas made by Perla of Pasión Ancestral, and the pulque‑fermented profile of Pecho Tierra in the mountains of Nuevo León—spirits that bend your expectations and expand what mezcal can be. If you care about terroir, craft, and honest sourcing, this one’s for you. Come for the stories; leave with a buyer’s toolkit: ask who grows the agave, how it’s roasted and fermented, and whether the family owns the brand. Then choose bottles that keep the flame honest. Like what you heard? Follow the show, leave a quick review, and share this episode with a friend who geeks out on agave. Your support helps small producer families get the spotlight they deserve.
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From the Green Point Palace Bar in Brooklyn, New York, writers and bartenders, Rita and Marissa, have intimate conversations with an eclectic mix of people from all walks of life about their passions, paranoia, and perspectives. Featured guests could be artists or authors, exterminators or private investigators, or the person sitting next to you at the bar. This is people at the core.
SPEAKER_02:Alright. We're cracking. We're live. We're live on the last day of summer. Oh, is that real? I'm a little sad about that. Yeah. I had to Google it. I was like, I know it's around now. Yeah. Ish. And things are getting weird. I've had this strange relationship with technology. Like it doesn't like me and just malfunctions for me. Um, so I want to blame it on the equinox. I don't know, Mercury and shit. Like, I don't know. Stuff like that. Uh okay. Sure.
SPEAKER_04:Anywho. Anywho. Anywho. Um well we've got Wilbur here today, so if you hear any pig snorting or random noises, that's him.
SPEAKER_02:Grunting, grumbling, yeah, it's not us. Right. Maybe it is us, but we're gonna blame it.
SPEAKER_04:Well, we're gonna blame it on him. Anyway. Exactly.
SPEAKER_02:All right. Well, I'm very excited to introduce our guests today. Yay. I've low key kind of stalked her on Instagram for a minute and officially got to meet her at a little tasting event uh in the neighborhood. Um, Miss Julia Cuthbertson. She is the founder of Las Chingonas Imports, i.e., Betes Women Imports. Um, and the company seems to focus really on bringing an agave-based spirits and other like cool liqueurs from Latin America, specifically Mexico, to the US market. Uh she was awarded in 2024 from 750 Daily uh award for her commitment to creating a springboard for Mescals from upper underrepresented regions, and it just so happened we had on the like editor, yeah. I think that's her official title of 750. Oh amazing! Tyler Weatherall. Um so yeah, so two birds. Ah, love that two birds, one pod. Yes, yeah. There you go. Um, but yeah, so before we get into your your biz, um, I'm curious. We always kind of start with the origin stories, like how did you get to New York? Were people at the core like your core being, but also like the apple shit. Uh and from my Google stocking, you say that you um are connected to Connecticut, Vermont, and Spain. Yes. Can we elaborate? Yeah.
SPEAKER_06:So I grew up in the New Haven, Connecticut area. So lots of opinions about pizza. We can get into that later. Um and then went to school in Vermont. Um, I've not been back much since I graduated. Uh 20 years ago. It was a liberal arts um school, but my as I would expect in Vermont. Yes, exactly. It it yes. But my concentration um, or my major, as we would call it in English, is was uh international studies with a focus on Spanish literature and culture.
SPEAKER_05:Cool.
SPEAKER_06:I didn't have any clue what I wanted to do with my life, but I had this connection to the Spanish-speaking world already that started when I was 16, or actually a little before. So I just knew I wanted to study sort of Spanish-focused things and Spanish language.
SPEAKER_02:And was that focus on Spanish from Spain, i.e., what your preface was, or was it in general?
SPEAKER_06:It was um from Spain, but only because I wanted to study abroad in Spain because I'd already spent time in South America. So um I was more interested in Latin America, but did that just as an excuse to sort of live in Europe. Um yeah, so why not? Yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_02:So the the the impetus was 16 in Latin America?
SPEAKER_06:Yeah, I uh was forced to study French from a young age and I never liked it. Mainly me too. It was like a snobbery thing, you know.
SPEAKER_04:No offense to the I actually went to school in Paris and uh and I studied like starting in third grade, and I just I don't remember, I could not retain any of it. Yeah, like awful. I studied it started in fourth grade, yeah.
SPEAKER_06:And it was a thousand percent just a like a French language is a language of culture and whatever, you know, left over from whatever. Um, and so I never felt a connection to French culture, and I kind of even at a young age realized why am I studying a language that isn't necessarily practical for me? Yeah, there's not many French speakers uh, you know, in the United States in general. And so the minute I could switch to Spanish, I did, and that was in ninth grade. It's a pretty easy transition because I'd already done five years of French, three years of Latin. Um, it was a act just getting the accent. And so at the age of 16, um, I had gone to a summer camp that then offered like trips, community service trips in different countries. And I asked my parents if I could do one, knowing that I had this like attraction to the Spanish-speaking world. So I went to Ecuador.
SPEAKER_01:Cool.
SPEAKER_06:Um, but the trip was missionary work? No, it was um it was like project-based community service. We like help build a school, like help build a bridge, kind of like infrastructural projects. But um, if anyone knows what was happening in the summer of 99 in Ecuador, they know it was a very tumultuous time politically. Yeah, so our trip got cut short um because there were lots of protests and fires in the streets. And um I was really upset about what was happening, but also that my chip died.
SPEAKER_04:Got joining. Totally.
SPEAKER_06:Yeah, I mean I was like, I just got woke. Yes. I started eating. And I could not speak very good Spanish, but still felt this like intense connection to the Latin world and just the colors, the music, the food, the people, the warmth, the how open they were. I lived with the family for part of the time, and it was just really eye-opening, and I just was like, I need more of that. It was not Connecticut vibes, no, not so much. Nope. Um, yeah, pretty different and pretty special. And so the next summer I was able to go uh to another place, which was Argentina, um, also for a month-long um trip. I lived with a family in the town of Gualawaichu in Entre Rios, um, about three hours from Buenos Aires. Okay. Um, and we also were doing sort of we were working in a guardaria, which is like a sort of like a daycare for kids from impoverished families. Um, and lived with a family, and I just loved life there. And so I was able to go back for a semester between high school and college. Nice because my school offered a program of starting mid-year, and I thought, well, this is perfect. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:Awesome.
SPEAKER_06:And that's where I really became fluent in Spanish with a very thick Argentinian accent.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, it was yo no sé. Is that the accent? Exactly. Mira, mira como habla, como hablas.
SPEAKER_04:That's so great though. I mean, and especially at a young age, to be able to experience that, you know. So I mean, similar with you, you know, to be able to do that at, you know.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, I was 16 first time I went to Oaxaca. Okay. And my heritage is northern Mexican. Um, but yeah, Oaxaca was my first real Mexico. Right. I fell in love, and then three years later, I was going to travel and I was gonna start in Oaxaca because I knew more or less um, because there was an exchange situation with uh cultural immersion, whatnot. Uh and then I ended up just staying.
SPEAKER_06:Look at that.
SPEAKER_04:It happens. It sucks you when. So then how did you end up here in New York?
SPEAKER_06:So I uh after college I lived in Spain for um I studied abroad in northern Spain. Um, and then I lived and I went back to Madrid and lived there for five years. Wow. Um and worked as a teacher knowing that that's not what I wanted to do with my life. Um found the world of public health. Um I'm was born into a family of do-gooders, and I think I knew I liked sort of health-related things, but didn't want to be a doctor. And so when I discovered this um public health world, I was like, ooh, maybe that's for me. I ended up um finding a madrilenio, okay, a boy who moved back to New York with me. Basically, I realized that for five years I was really over being a teacher, it was not for me. I was in my late 20s, I wanted to kind of start a career path. And so we both moved back or moved to New York. Um we both went to grad school, so I got my master's in public health.
SPEAKER_04:Awesome.
SPEAKER_06:And he got a master's in um in industrial engineering. Um and it was he didn't really, it was sort of just an excuse to be able to move to the States because he needed a visa, right? So but it worked out, um, set him on a career path here. Um that was in 2011. So we studied from 2011 to 2013, lived up in Washington Heights, and then moved to Brooklyn the second we graduated because all my friends and some family was here in Brooklyn. Right. And so I've been in Brooklyn since 2013. That relationship ended. Um, but it's was a wonderful what lasted and put me in a different path in life, which I'm sure we'll get to once we start diving into Mescal.
SPEAKER_02:And uh deeper linguistic uh practicum.
SPEAKER_06:Yes, exactly, exactly. Yes, I got real good at Spanish from Spain, but always had my sort of like Latin roots in there. Exactly, exactly. The the and the theta never like really rolled off my tongue. So it was a sort of a whole it was a mix right on a confusing accent.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, I I also I mean I grew up with you know Spanglish with my grandparents, but you know, moving to Mexico that was a whole different football game and working in bars, a whole different level of groserias that were not part of my family's uh vernacular. And then I lived with Urgent Argentinian and Uruguayan guys and worked with a bunch of Argentinians, and some of my best friends were Italian. So I had a really bizarre. I still didn't, depending on who I'm hanging out with, yeah. Um it's I'm kind of the same.
SPEAKER_06:I'm very easily adaptable. So I've had I think it's a skill.
SPEAKER_02:And I and I went through years of like identity and defending. It's like, oh, you don't look Mexican. I'm like, oh, you must be half. I'm like, what it doesn't matter. Okay, anybody in Mexico can people from Mexico argue with me. Anybody else, fuck off. Yeah. Um so I dealt with a lot of that, and especially because my accent is weird sometimes, but now I think it's fucking cool. That's cool. I agree.
SPEAKER_04:Love it. I used to, well, I was born in Missouri, so I had a very thick southern accent and then spent my teens in Minnesota. Oh, wow. So I was like a weird hybrid for a while there. I don't know if it's a lot of people.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_04:Exactly, basically. And then I think they just like canceled each other out. Oh, that's so funny. I know. And now New York. Yeah, and now I don't know what it is.
SPEAKER_02:And I think even more so now is we have a reading series, so over the last few years we've been reading out loud, and so we're very conscious of our enunciation and speaking. Exactly. And also with the podcast. We let it go more with the podcast, I think, because we try and not be too in our heads, but you know, it's it I think it influences our articulation.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, for sure. So does lack of sleep. Yeah, right. I think we're all in the same way. In surf sides and I don't know. Everything else. Um, so well, let's get into the mascale thing. So tell us more about just what you do.
SPEAKER_02:So the Madrileño somehow opened the portal to this.
SPEAKER_06:Well, in very indirectly. So that relationship ended um in the end of 2016. And I was kind of in like a felt a little bit lost, maybe like, you know, what I envisioned for my life was all of a sudden changing. Um and was still in the frame of mind of like, as a woman, I want I felt the pressure to kind of check off the boxes that society tells you you should check off.
SPEAKER_05:Yeah.
SPEAKER_06:And I would thought that I was like behind and oh my god, I'm so old. I mean, I was like 33, 34.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah.
SPEAKER_06:If only I had the perspective I have now.
SPEAKER_04:I know, I understand completely.
SPEAKER_06:And so uh in 20, early 2018, I ended up traveling to Mexico with a friend of mine who actually met in Madrid for my Madrid days teaching at the American School of Madrid, and she moved back um to the States, and uh we went to visit another friend who we knew from our days teaching in Madrid, and I I had to convince myself to go on this trip because I thought, well, I have no money, like I'm the only one paying rent now, and I should be responsible and not travel. But I just something in me was telling me, like, you just have to go because I'm the happiest that I am when I'm traveling, and especially to Spanish-speaking countries. And so we traveled to Mexico City and I reconnected with a roommate from Madrid, who's um a woman named Majo from uh Morelia, Michoacan, and who had also moved away from Madrid and got married to a German guy. I didn't realize she actually moved back to Germany, but she happened to be in Mexico the exact same dates I was because her brother was getting married. Oh, and she invited me and my friend I was traveling with to crash the wedding because it was in the same exact weekend in Oaxaca. We were all there the exact same dates. It was this weird, like stars aligning.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, it's like so serendipitous.
SPEAKER_06:Oaxaca weddings are so fun. Yes. And so I um was not dressed appropriately for a wedding because I was told two days before, but no one seemed to care. I got there when everyone was already like many mascal drinks deep. Um, and she introduced me to all of her friends. It was an amazing night, and I got a boyfriend out of it. A major connection to one of the um testigos, like one of the witnesses and witnesses, basically.
SPEAKER_03:Yeah.
SPEAKER_06:And we started a relationship. I went back to Mexico three weeks later, and it was basically like every month we were seeing each other. I was always going to Mexico because why would I?
SPEAKER_04:No, I loved that. Yeah.
SPEAKER_06:Um, that relationship also didn't last, but it served an amazing purpose, which was he is a very proud Mexican, and I was able to see a lot of the country and drink a lot of Mescal. Um and I just got sucked into the world of Mescal through drinking a lot of it on these trips to visit him. But also on the Brooklyn side, I had a friend um named Mateo, who is still one of my closest friends, who worked at a Mescal bar in Washington Avenue in Prospect Heights that no longer exists. It was called Madre Mescaleria. And at the time, they had one of the I think most impressive Mescal selections, and it happened to be a 10-minute walk from my apartment.
SPEAKER_05:Sweet. Wow.
SPEAKER_06:So I just started spending a lot of time there that same year, learning, nerding out, just sitting at the bar. It became like my second home. They were great about educating, they would lend me books. Um, so I really got into like the background of Mescal. I knew I was interested from a cultural perspective because from my few days in Oaxaca, I could tell this is something that really is uh has a deep um connection to history, to people, to land to land, to to folklore, to spiritualism, to everything. And that alone intrigued me. Um, but then trying all these mezcales that I just really I was fascinated by the range of flavor profiles and just understanding why they were so different from each other. And so every time I would go to Mexico, I would bring back bottles from this one little store that happened to be across the street from the Airbnb I stayed in that very first trip called Mis Mescales. And the owner, Omar, is now one of my closest friends in Mexico. Um and it's I also consider it like my second home. And I would bring back bottles from this store that only carries small, sort of independently owned um brands. And one of the brands I discovered there was Rayo Seco, which is the first brand that I brought in. And I thought that it was really interesting and cool that they had these bottles from the state of Guerrero when you couldn't find a lot outside of Oaxaca on shelves. And so I started bringing those bottles back among others, and then I I launched um the Jess McGay project, which was an educational and tasting events platform. I started out of my apartment at the end of 2018 in Crown Heights.
SPEAKER_04:That is so cool.
SPEAKER_06:Yeah, that was cool. So I basically was a friend of mine who saw what was happening, and she was like, Why don't you do some type of tasting event? Because I want to learn what you've been learning, and I would love to sample what you're bringing back from Mexico. And I thought, you know, that's a really good idea. So I threw together this sort of like dinner for six girlfriends. It started out as women only, it was mujeres and mascal or mujeres por en mascal. Um, and I put together educational materials and sort of guided people through all these different bottles. And I I put it up on Instagram and got this huge response from people were like, Well, what is this? I want to go to the next one. Sweet. And it just sort of like took off, and I started collaborating with local chefs, photographers, um, cocktail makers, um, lots of creatives, yeah, and really used Mescal Education as a platform to create community. And I eventually opened it up to men as well. So I had amigos por el mescal. Because the guys got jealous. Yeah. And that's okay. So I did both, and I did sort of different platforms or different um, I did like dinner formats, and then I did more like uh mingly sort of happy hour style formats. Some that were just from my personal collection, some that were branded. So I would team up with some brands that wanted to feature their mascales. Yeah, so that was sort of like my introduction to the industry, um, and getting to know people in the spirits world and the mascale world in New York. Amazing. Um, was through yeah, just doing this thing for my house. That is so cool. I love that. So inspirational. It was it was really fun. Right. Yeah. Do you still do them then or? Not so much. The pandemic um obviously affected that. I did it right up until the pandemic. Oh, um, I was supposed to have one like March 17th or something. Obviously, that got canceled of 2020. Um, but I have been invited to do them in other people's homes. I also do them in like office settings, so I'll do like as like team building. I'm about to do one in this giant law firm next month. Um, so that's cool. But I also happen to live in a place uh at the time that was this shared brownstone that was beautiful and allowed me this space that was gorgeous to host people. And I live in a different apartment that is lovely, but not quite as large. I'm an inviting comedy group. Exactly. But also, which we'll get into my import company got off the ground and that now occupies almost all of my time.
SPEAKER_04:So let's segue into that a little.
SPEAKER_06:Yeah, yeah. So through um getting to know people in the Mescal world, I met someone who became my business partner um who is no longer part of the company, but she and I were very aligned in terms of something what we wanted to do, like a real business in terms of bringing in uh mostly Moscow or Mexican spirits that were from non-Oaxcan states. Um, because we both had personal connections to brands and producers from specifically from Guerrero, thanks to Rayo Seco. And she had a lot of connections to Puebla. And so we had this idea like we can bring in things that are people haven't seen before, um, and give a platform to these lesser-known areas in Mexico. Um, and so that became an idea in the middle of 2019. It became official we were gonna launch Rayo Seco the end of February of 2020. And then we eventually launched to market in June 2021, which is two bottles of Rayo Seco. So that's how we started. Yeah. It we probably needed that year anyway to do a lot of the logistical and legal stuff to get our whole business off the ground. So it actually wasn't like a terrible thing in terms of our business that the pandemic happened. Right. A forced investigation. Yeah, it slowed things down, you know, we weren't like missing out, and then we were ready to launch when things were kind of opening up and getting back to normal a little bit.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, which makes sense.
SPEAKER_02:So, how so I know that one of your stated preferences is for family-owned, smaller productions, women-owned. Um, how do you just go like, hey, um, I'm picking a state, let's there's some agave's and like going from there of just like rather than shooting a dart somewhere. Yeah, you said that you had some connections, but your process of of developing relationships, building trust, and like coming in as a foreigner, of course, and as a woman. And I'm just curious like how that may have played out. One in the business of importation, you don't see a lot of, or there's specifically, hey, it's a woman-owned, blah, blah, blah. And then there's like 40,000 men. Plus, in production in in Mexico, it's 40,000 men and a few women.
SPEAKER_06:Right. Of course. It's all was a very unexpected and natural kind of organic path. So as I said, the owners of Rayo Seco kind of became friends because I was bringing their bottles back and tagging them on Instagram, and we started talking, and they were like, I think who's this girl in front of them?
SPEAKER_02:It was like just the fangirl and all the things.
SPEAKER_06:Yeah, it's so kind of random. And so they're like, next time you're in Mexico, let's actually meet. I was like, All right. So we met in person on one of my trips. We really got along. They gave me some like special high-proof mascal straight from the still. And um puntas. That was, yeah, almost puntas. That was that was fun. And we just continued talking, and they every time I would go to Mexico, we would hang out. And so they knew that I was exploring the idea of importing. I knew that they were looking to export, but I just assumed, oh, their product is so good. Um, why would they want to work with someone like me that is a first-time importer that really doesn't have any experience? So I didn't broach the topic with them. They approached me and they were like, Hey, have you found this product? Because they knew I was kind of looking for the right product. And I um and they're like, Have you found have you found something? And I said, No, not yet. And I said, Have you found an importer? And they said, No, do you want to do this together? And I thought, oh my God, yes, yes. So I was so honored that they even wanted to work with me. And I think that's because we had built this friendship and this relationship based on trust and authentic respect. Exactly. They knew how interested I was in their product. I mean, I was buying it myself, bringing it back in my suitcase and featuring it in these educational events. So I think that was the most important thing to them. We were learning together. They had never exported either, so we were gonna like figure it out, you know, together. And the most important thing was that we had this um trust that we'd built over like two years. Um, and then they basically through other personal connections or through them, we met the other brands that I work with. So I haven't sought out any brand. It's sort of all they've like become friends naturally, or they've come to me and been like, hey, so-and-so gave me your number. Um, so which is super Mexican.
SPEAKER_02:Yes, exactly. It was like, oh, my tia knows somebody. Oh, well, just go ask teller that you're friends with like Elibaria and you know, just talk, just talk on they should be home, just knock on the door.
SPEAKER_06:Yeah, okay. Exactly. I mean, it's a very small world. So it's like the the spirits world is small, but the mezcal world is even smaller, and in Mexico, it feels like most people know each other. Um, Lopez Real was the second brand I brought in, which is Oaxacan, um, but it is 100% family producer owned. And that was through a friend I met in Agave field in Puebla who was working with them at the time. Um, put us in touch and we said, you know, they seem like a cool family, but we're not doing anything Oaxacan. It's just not part of our mission. And kind of over the course of the pandemic helped them figure out a way to get on the market on their own in California. Um, but then also went to Oaxaca and visited the family because we kind of gotten to know each other and just fell in love with the family in the process and realized, recognized the value of a cocktail-oriented um product uh for the portfolio. And we so we made the exception for Oaxacan products, but made the decision that for anything Oaxacan it had to be a hundred percent family producer owned.
SPEAKER_02:Okay.
SPEAKER_06:Um it's a little bit harder to check those boxes outside of Oaxaca, but in Oaxaca, it's pretty easy because there's so much Mescal production.
SPEAKER_02:Um, that's been going on for like four generations. Exactly.
SPEAKER_06:So yeah, and I had to offer something that was like a little bit different um to the market. In the case of Lopez Real, they are agaveros and their mezcaleros and their brand owners. So they uh have about 150 agave, 150,000 agaves growing in agave fields around their Palenque. And it's very rare to find a family that does everything. So they they tend to the land, they grow the agave, they do the entire artisanal process. Of course, they hire local people to help with some the manual labor. Um, and they do all the labeling, bottling, all the business side, right at the Palenque, which is also their house. My god, that is so you're like, we can't pass up this opportunity. They're such wonderful people, and the product is great. And so the mission kind of like shifted a little bit, but still remains the core, is really like bringing in things that are new and different in some way. Gotcha. And whenever possible, family owner, whenever possible, um le lesser represented regions.
SPEAKER_02:Um, would you for the audience give a little quick rundown on vocabulary of Mescal versus Agave spirit and like some other politics with labeling and how that that kind of translates to big brands into smaller families?
SPEAKER_06:Of course. So Mescal is sort of the umbrella um category. Tequila is a type of mezcal, so it is a more sort of narrow, usually more industrially produced um type of mascal. Most of it comes from the state of Jalisco. Um and certified mezcal has its own denomination of origin, just like tequila does. So it uh the government dictates where it can be made legally to be called Mescal. But um there's the whole debate about to certify or not to certify. Um, and so if you don't certify, you are brought in under the category of agave spirits or spirits distilled from agave. You can word it one of two ways, legally on the label. Um, and a lot of brands who could uh they could legally certify if they wanted to, like most of Rayo Seco could, because their spirits come from somewhere within the denomination of origin, oftentimes choose not to these days because they realize it is a big headache, essentially. It costs money, it slows the process down. Um, and the main agency that is given the authority to certify has been slapped on the wrist many times by the Mexican government for corrupt practices.
SPEAKER_01:Handshake sign deals. Yeah. Yeah. Right.
SPEAKER_06:So a lot of brands are like, well, I don't even want to have to deal with this agency. I and they're recognizing that, at least in the US, the agave spirits um category is growing. More and more brands are opting out of certification. And I think consumers recognize it's really just a political difference in that the liquid is the same. And it doesn't really matter whether it says miscal or agave spirits. Of course, that is a big debate. Um but uh but that's why everything that I have besides Lopez Real is in agave spirit.
SPEAKER_02:Um that's such a different, I don't know the import world, but I know the consumption world, like specifically in Oaxaca, where people are focusing not on the certification, but the actual agave or the agave um ensemble blend. Yes. And where they're from, what the agave are, not if they're certified mascot. And you still have the kind of underground thing where people are delivering from unbranded places. Right. Like my dude, I saw him on WhatsApp and he's fourth generation. He's like, Hey, are you coming to Central between these days and these days? And I'm like, What do you have? And he gives me a list and he brings it in water bottles. Of course. Twenty years ago, when I was bartending there, it you didn't have choices. You had the Palenka you worked with as a bar. Yes. And oftentimes a senor would come, or his delivery person would come on donkey with gasoline things and deliver it to your bar, and you'd pour it in your bottles, and there's your house mascal. And there were like two or three maybe brands that existed. And nobody cared. Everyone wanted the house mascal because exactly.
SPEAKER_06:Right. Yeah, it was the most economic. It was the relationship that you had with that producer. Exactly. I mean, I think in Mexico, it um at least uh since Mescal is taken off, they perhaps place uh they they think it's more important to have a bottle that is uh says mascal on it because they have a whole history where Mescal was not really respected. Um, on a national level, right? Like tequila in like fancy brands. That's what people that was quote unquote trustworthy. Um, even though we're now realizing that a lot of brands use adulterated uh, you know, tequila, it's a whole other category. But Mescal was the one that people didn't really know about. They all come in plastic bottles, like there was a lot of mystery behind it and a lot of distrust. And so to have the word mascal in the bottle in Mexico, I think, is more important for certain brands because it legitimizes their product. Whereas in the US, it's like we don't have that history or that same relationship with Mescal.
SPEAKER_02:Right.
SPEAKER_06:And so we're just like nerding out as people who are learning about it now.
SPEAKER_02:Interesting. I I'd feel like I don't know, I go to like dive bars and I go to places where I know people where it's not necessarily the thing in Oaxaca per se. Mexico City is a whole different base, which is much more New York aligned. Um, and and having these, oh, we have these high-end mascals and featuring those. And we're, you know, fourth best bar in the world. Right.
SPEAKER_06:Right.
SPEAKER_02:All of that.
SPEAKER_06:Yeah. I remember the owners of Rayo Seco, when we talked about working together, they said, Well, we are working on getting certified, and it's gonna like take us a bit. And I said, Well, out of curiosity, why are you certifying? And they said, Well, because how are how are the bottles gonna sell if we doesn't say if it doesn't say mascal on the label? And I said, Well, just so you know, at least in New York, like it doesn't really matter as much these days. And there's some of the most well-respected um and expensive brands are actually Agave Spirits. And they said, Oh, okay, well, in that case we're not certifying it. So they were relieved to hear that and were looking for a way out. Okay, and so they've never looked back, and especially a bunch of the bottles that they um have in their portfolio come from outside the denomination of origin. So they cannot certify those no matter what. If they wanted to, guys, even if they wanted to, and I have two of those bottles here, one from Estalo Mexico and one from Sonora. And so it would also be a little confusing to have different, you know, categories for different bottles from different regions. So they just said, you know what, we're not certifying.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, interesting, right? I love this. I can't wait to like like retell all this information to them. Because, you know, as a bar owner, like I love my Mescal drinkers because they're so like into it, right? They're either really into it or they're like, I don't know, you know, really intense. Yeah, great information. No, I love it. I love it, it's awesome.
SPEAKER_02:So tagging along to that and the proliferation of the rest of the world, jumping on the Mescal and Agave Spirit Badenwagan, being on the field in the field. Um there's a lot of talk also about sustainability, about the ecological impact of having and also the doubts that are seated, like we were talking about some of some wild agave that you have brought for us that we're gonna taste. Uh it requires a minimum of 25 years for gestation. So, how is it that you have hundreds of brands now claiming that they are utilizing these agaves that require 25 to 30 years to mature to be harvested? So that seems I mean, math is not my strong suit, but the numbers don't always seem to line up. And I've had sidebar conversations about tequila that they're cutting them early and then they're pumping them full of vanilla and glycerin, as is legally allowed through that that little percentage um variable uh to get this product out. I mean, as Rita, like you can tell us how many cases you go through a week just of tequila, and it's really hard to fathom that it's all by the book and above board to produce at that quantity. Like, I don't want to throw anyone's livelihood under the bus, but I have some serious questions about that.
SPEAKER_06:Oh, yeah, absolutely. I mean, and that is that was originally one of the primary motivators for staying out of Oaxaca when it comes to Mescal because most of the high volume Mescals are produced in Oaxaca, and we just thought, and there's a big sustainability crisis there, not only for the agave supply, but for deforestation, there's a lot of deforestation. Water and water. Oh my gosh, yeah, water. I mean the amount of forest fires that happen every year and just decimate, you know, huge plots of land, um, entire mountainsides, and um they're now having to bring up um wood from the southern, from the Sierra Sur de Oaxaca, um, because there's like just there's no more basically in Los Balles Centrales. Um, yeah, and of course they use wood for the roasting of the Gaves and then for the distillation. So it's a big problem. So that's why we thought, well, if we stay out of Oaxaca, where there's more natural resources, it hasn't been exploited yet. Right. There's small batch, it's mostly wild harvested, and we thought there's less of an environmental impact, and also choosing um brand and producer partners that really care about the sustainability and their practices was important to us. Um Lopez Real, because they're agaveros, they don't have to buy any of their agave, and they are um you know taking care of the land, they let agaves reproduce naturally.
SPEAKER_02:Meaning that they own the land, they're cultivating themselves, they are harvesting themselves.
SPEAKER_06:Yeah, and they prefer to just pump out espadin because for them that's the most sustainable way because they're actually growing the agave themselves and not relying on buying from other people because who knows where those agaves are coming from, or did they harvest them early? Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:So and Espadin, just to clarify, is the the classic agave used for the mascals you're gonna find in most bars or just like on your well or your reserve, like your basic Easic founded, and it requires less time to actually mature. So like seven to eight years.
SPEAKER_06:Seven to eight years, exactly. Right, you know, nothing, yeah. And it also has a high um sugar concentration, so you get more of a yield, exactly. So it ends up being a less expensive agave to work with. Um, but you know, it is a big problem. I think we're at a turning point right now in agave spirits world in general, where there are people are discovering that you know they were romanticizing a spirit that doesn't necessarily um, you know, their story isn't necessarily what you thought it was. I mean, we're seeing this actually with tequila with lawsuits.
SPEAKER_02:Um weren't our friends, Mr. Amigos. Um, are they?
SPEAKER_04:Oh, I haven't tell me more.
SPEAKER_02:Allegedly, to prevent ourselves, say, in the DJ world. Yeah, um allegedly it was discovered that they were putting in sugar cane instead of agave. So tequila is a blue baber, it's one specific agave for tequila. And again, it's about a seven-year maturation. And I've been to Jalisco and I've been to tequila, and I've seen the fields, but I've also worked in bars for 25 years, and the math doesn't make sense of that. Um so you are legally allowed to have some fillers to call yourself a hundred percent, that is built into the actual certification. However, you can't do half fucking sugar cane that right, right, yeah. Yeah.
SPEAKER_06:Um, and so I think in the Mescal side, people have for many years feared what they call the tequilaization of Mescal because we are seeing more and more brands out there. Um, I mean, Lopez Real is in the town that's the most famous for Mescal production, Santiago Matalán. They're across the street from Illegal. I mean, they're the amount of big brands that are right in this town, there's just a huge so many that you would recognize. And they see what's going on with a lot of them, and they kind of, you know, I say, Hey, I saw this brand on the market for this like crazy low price. What is the deal? And they were like, I think you know what's happening there.
SPEAKER_03:Really?
SPEAKER_06:Yeah, they're putting sugarcane in there.
SPEAKER_02:So but even like Iregal like started out as a New Yorker um in Guatemala, bringing over Mescal, which is cute and adorable story. And I personally know them and I I like them as people. I've been to uh Maras Historias and and I've been to um their Palenque produces a couple different types, um, but also recently they were appropriated by Bacardi. Yes. So 100% means there will be changes in the quality and the production.
SPEAKER_06:And to be and to be clear, I was not calling out illegal. No, no, no. But I know exactly. I'm just saying they literally are crossing from them and many other brands. It's it's it's the Pusa Miska. They have their ear to the ground, and I have such a close relationship with them that they're able to tell me these things, and I they're very honest with me. And so, you know, uh they they also see what's going on in the ground. And I also one of I bring in two aguardientes, which are rums, and one is from Puebla, and he the product I bring in is 100% natural, um, open, you know, air fermentation tanks and all that good stuff, but he also produces something for more local consumption that's like more of an industrial sugar cane distillate. Um you gotta make your money. And he is approached by um tequila and mascal brand owners on a regular basis who buy sugar cane from him. And again, he's he is not there to judge, he is a business person and he will sell to whoever wants to buy from him. And but he sees what's happening also because he's literally providing the sugar cane for some of the large brands. And so you know we're seeing we're already seeing this happening. It's now coming to light through a few lawsuits.
SPEAKER_02:It's hard because it's because I think what sugarcane actually only requires one harvest.
SPEAKER_06:Exactly. So yes.
SPEAKER_02:If you're short, exact yeah, there you go.
SPEAKER_06:Uh-huh. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, so you know, I'm really hoping that tequila can remain, I'm sorry, that Mescal can remain more of an honest spirit, but we are seeing adulteration. Um, and it's just really hard. It's hard for consumers to know because they're so removed from the process. And even if you do go there, you're not necessarily seeing, you know, what they're doing. Right. They you see what they want to show you. Right. Um, so it can be hard to know. And I spend a fair amount of time in Mexico and I like to talk to people. Um, and so I'm often able to like get information just through like talking to trustworthy people on the ground who are able to tell me like what's really going on. But it's it's hard for the average person to know these things.
SPEAKER_02:Absolutely. And I want to sidebar ask your opinion. I'm not gonna name brands because I don't want to go into that specifically, but there is, for example, uh a four-generation mescal producing family, and one person from that has shot off and has gone to school to understand chemistry, biology, and they're studying um cultivating wild agave and different ways of propagating it and really trying to make it a scientific process to create these products, but in a sustainable fashion. On the other side of that, I other scientists have said wild agave can only be wild agave, and anything that is cultivated is just not in the question. Just if you have an opinion on that.
SPEAKER_06:Yeah, well, you know, um I have like uh the sacotoro that I bring in from Guerrero. Um, the producer Israel Petronillo will he has this uh plot of land that's in front of his house. It's like a steep, rocky um piece of land where not much will grow there except agaves, because they'll kind of grow anywhere. And so he will replant some um sacotoro from the wild into his front yard. Uh-huh. Um, and then when they mature, he'll use them, right? So in his bottles is probably, he calls those agaves semi-cultivated. And so even though it is mague silvestre, so it's wild agave, maybe like half of what's in there is actually semi-cultivated. Um but at the end of the day, if they're gonna grow, they're still, it's really just because it's on his property, but it's still growing in a wild way.
SPEAKER_02:Right.
SPEAKER_06:Um, and I don't have a problem with that. And I think if it's to save, if the agave is able to grow and thrive in that environment, then why not? Yeah.
SPEAKER_04:Exactly.
SPEAKER_06:Um to protect these species because there are some varietals that are going extinct. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:And I'm like, dude, it's his own property. He's educating people. Yeah. And it's a project that will have to live beyond him. Right. If it takes 30 years for this motherfucker to mature, you were creating a whole system of inquiry, investigation, and sustainability. And for me, I was like a hundred percent. And then I heard all of these other contentious things about purity of wild and all of this.
SPEAKER_04:I'm like, I mean, you're gonna get that with anything though. Right.
SPEAKER_06:I was just curious being more involved in those conversations rather than there are purists and there are people that like to romanticize the process, and it can be quite romantic. Um, but there's the reality and there's you know environmental impact, and to deplete an entire, you know, varietal of species, yeah, supply of agave varietal, like just out of romanticism, I think is really irresponsible uh and unnecessary if there's ways to reproduce in a more controlled environment. If that agave takes to that type of environment, then why not? And then you can replant in the wild.
SPEAKER_02:And I'm like, my nerd goal is to like volunteer. I don't even don't even pay me. Feed me, give me a place to sleep. I will spend a year and like go through all of this and plot. Okay, so you're taking some are seeds, some are the bulbs, some are through bats and like all of this, and you're seeing what works, you know. Yeah, I love nerd shit like that. And it's it's so respectful to me of honoring this, but also pivoting for reality of like I want to keep giving this gift, and let's be smart and let's learn something and inform things and create a generation upon generation of people who are informed and care.
SPEAKER_06:I think you see more and more producers are realizing that this is a serious issue, and they're creating bivos, which are like the nurseries that you can um grow agaves in, and then they are replanting them around six months, they'll replant them in the wild. And so that's amazing. Yeah. I mean, we shouldn't be encouraging this. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02:But then you have his uh, you know, the boogeyman stories of Mescal people, I mean tequila people coming in and stealing all different types of agaves and well, then that is happening actually.
SPEAKER_06:So it is. I mean, they'll actually uh the same producer that I was just mentioning who uh makes the Sakatoro and a pancancha that I bring in in northern Guerrero State has um tequileros uh who come and buy Sakatoro because it is like uh kind of related to the Espadin. They used to think it was in Gustafolia, so it could pass. Like if they were to mix it with Blue Weber, it could pass um undetected, and they're buying it from these um producers in in Guerrero because they're running out of agave supply. In Halison.
SPEAKER_02:We've got to work on the script for like the Mescal murder mystery. And um, I'm serious. I'm down. I need a new creative project. Oh, yeah.
SPEAKER_06:I mean, there is definitely a dark side. And I mean, it sounds like it, yeah. I mean, especially in tequila, there's so much money in tequila. Right. It's more, I think, focused on like tequila production and why there's some security issues in Alisco is because there's just so much money in those brands.
SPEAKER_02:There's not that many brands of Mescal that are at that level yet in terms of someone's house and they've got a little hacienda and little donkeys, and like we've got five generations of people there. Yeah. Yeah, not there.
SPEAKER_06:Hopefully, we'll ever get there.
SPEAKER_02:And I've been to Cuervo's estate. Ah, and I've only seen it in photo. In tequila. It's it's um so Jose Cuervo is the number one tequila guy who took over the town of tequila and created this. I equate it to kind of the Michael Jackson, like the neverland of tequila. Like it's a whole reinforced, there's the there's the um the crows there, the cueros, the yeah, it's a whole thing. There's trains, there's videos. I did the tour because I was fascinated, and it's a whole thing. And you you were sold. You don't get the the gold, the shit that you get here, which is why everyone thinks tequila sucks, who was 21. But like it's a whole, it's a whole town. Like he owns the town. Like he well, the family owns the town, the estate owns the town, and it's very impressive. Uh, and if you didn't, yeah, you it's easy to be smitten. Absolutely.
SPEAKER_06:Yeah, they know how to put on a show, right? It's a huge industry.
SPEAKER_04:Um, yeah. Well, on that note, are there any ones that you want to highlight for us before we go into the questions?
SPEAKER_06:Oh, in terms of in terms of producers? Yeah, producer. Products that like you'd want our listeners to try. Oh, yeah. I mean, it's so fun. How do I even like where do I even start? They're all my babies, of course. What's your favorite?
SPEAKER_02:It's really something new, or perhaps that may fall out of the normal.
SPEAKER_06:Yeah. Well, so one I would say, um, you know, I think each brand I work with is is special in its own way, but one that is really like off the charts different is the brand Pecho Tierra, and they're made in Nueve León. So this is northeastern Mexico. The city of Monterrey is the most well known. Yes, Los Regios. Those are people from Monterrey.
SPEAKER_02:If you think of like Dallas in the 80s of like that show, those are like regios, like these over the top, especially women. I'm I'm sorry, my my friend married into that family, and I've seen. Um but just yes, proper, fancy, right, classy.
SPEAKER_06:Yeah, they're because like nice shit. Next to Monterrey is San Pedro Garza, which is I think the most, the wealthiest zip code in all of Latin America. So it's technically a separate city, but it like they're really they abut each other, so it's hard to distinguish. But there's so there's a lot of money in Monterrey. But about two to three hours south is a town called Laguna de Sanchez. And um, they make some really special spirits there. And what makes it so different beyond the fact that this is way off the beaten path in an area that is definitely not part of the denomination of origin, um, is that they, because it's cold at night year-round, because we're up at 2,000 meters above sea level and north um eastern Mexico, um, they use pulque for the fermentation. And pulque is a kombucha-like substance that is derived from agave sap.
SPEAKER_02:Chiapas, 2000, drunk in the streets.
SPEAKER_06:Everyone, if you spend enough time in Mexico, everyone has some pulque story.
SPEAKER_04:Right, right.
SPEAKER_06:Pocho, pulque. Usually it has a good and a bad uh side to it. Like start it out great.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah.
SPEAKER_06:But it's um it's an ancient spirit that's been made for millennia. And um because it's already a fermented beverage, it helps accelerate the fermentation. So that's the that's the reason that they use it, is because it's so cold. If they didn't kick start the fermentation somehow, it would just take forever. But the pulque it's has its own flavor that it imparts on the mezcal. So it drinks, some people say more like a rum agricole than a than a mascal. It's almost unrecognizable as a mezcal if you've never had anything like this. Um, it's very labor-intensive. The the town where the pulque is made is three hours away from the ranchito where Dan Jorge makes the mezcal. So it's a whole day trip to go and bring back about a thousand liters of pulque.
SPEAKER_02:And yes, I mean, if this takes a long fucking time, then it's worth something.
SPEAKER_06:Yeah, it makes an already super complex product even more complex when you add in this other element to it. And it's just such a beautiful area. It's always shocking when I bring people there. It's just very unexpected. It's this area that's kind of known for adventure sports. So these people like they have a bungee. I haven't done it yet, but there is a bungee jump nearby. People go up with these little like dune buggies up into the mountains, ATVs and a lot of rock climbing. You know, um uh Monterrey is La Ciudad de las Montañas or de la Sierra. And so there's uh these really dramatic mountain ranges that make for a gorgeous drive. And you also will see people rock climbing on the way. So it's a really, like, really amazing place to visit. Um, and this mascala is just so, so different that I love having it to sort of showcase the really wide range of flavor profiles and processes in the world of Agony Spirits. Um, so that's a really fun one. Hopefully, people can get their hands on some pecho tierra.
SPEAKER_04:We should put those in the notes. Oh, yeah. Absolutely.
SPEAKER_02:Send me some whatever stuff. Yeah, absolutely. Awesome.
SPEAKER_04:Well, let's do one quick question and then see where we roll.
SPEAKER_02:Um Julia, do you want to pour us a little taste? Yeah, and can we talk about this as I'm looking for a question?
SPEAKER_06:Absolutely. I'm gonna pour and I so I did not bring pecho tierra, but I brought um a bottle from the brand Passion Ancestral, which is one of the two brands. That I just launched. And this one is a becuela, which is what they call tepextate in Santa Caterina Minas, where this is from. Um tepextate are agaves that can take up to 30 years to grow in the ground. Um because of that, they end up being very pricey, but very complex in flavor. And this particular batch was made by the producer whose name is Alexis. It was made by his mom, Perla. And since I love highlighting women whenever possible, it's not always possible, but in this case, I just I adore her as a human, and I think it's really special that she made this batch. Um, and so we get to sip on this batch of Biquela made by a chingona named Perla.
SPEAKER_02:And we don't recall what is chingona badass bitch. Women. Chingona. Yes, like a boss bitch. Chingon. Chingar is the word that it's derived from. Like to to fuck. But like fuck, it has all of these like layers of my cell.
SPEAKER_04:Kind of like it does in English. Heaven in my mouth. Oh, I'm so glad you think so. So good.
SPEAKER_06:It's pretty amazing. So good. This was a 36-liter batch that was made in February of this year.
SPEAKER_04:It's just like paradise in my mouth. This is really good.
SPEAKER_06:Um the main uh production um difference in this is that it's clay pot distilled.
SPEAKER_04:Gotcha.
SPEAKER_06:And so anything included in clay pots is sort of like a separate category of mascal because of the effect that the clay material has on the mascal. And I think it gives it this sort of roundness, this kind of warmth on top of the complexities of the agave itself that I really enjoyed.
SPEAKER_02:It adds a little like cavernous thing. But if you actually take clay drinking vessels or or whatnot, it absorbs some of them. And then so when you add more things, I feel like it kind of takes out and puts back in previous things. So there's a conversation with the spirits that were there before where it's not like a kickback, but it influences part of that when you have the air come through. Absolutely. Yeah, it's a whole other thing.
SPEAKER_06:Exactly. It's a porous material which makes it more complicated to work with because you you lose some yield. They're also fragile vessels, so you have to replace them more frequently. Um, this is also hand mashed. It's it's a true ancestral process. And so anytime you see clay pots for the most part, um, it's also gonna be a slightly elevated price tag because of how labor-intensive it is, and and it's naturally a sort of smaller batch.
SPEAKER_04:I love it, yeah.
SPEAKER_06:I'm so glad you like it.
SPEAKER_02:All right. Okay. Describe an important teacher in your life outside of school. And I like to open these up to impersonal interpretations, whether you think it's a person, a thing, or a place or whatnot, or experience. So I don't always go so literal with this. I like to take it as outside of school? Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER_04:Does my dog count?
SPEAKER_02:Sure.
SPEAKER_04:I mean, he it just teaches me compassion and love and unconditional love, yeah. And I guess for me, Lorda, my best friend. She teaches me so much, you know, just about life and and growth and friendship. So I'm gonna pick my dog and my best friend. And Fiona. See, now I'm going down my other best friend. Okay, done. No, I thought no, I'm just a 16-year-old teenage girl. I'm like, okay, I love friends. Okay, I like love. But just to be, you know, simplistic about it, I think I learned the most from my close friendships and you know, my fur partner.
SPEAKER_06:That's lovely.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah. How about you?
SPEAKER_06:Are you?
SPEAKER_02:You got it, you gotta, you got it?
SPEAKER_06:You know, I'm sure I could think of so many people, places, and things. Um the one that's coming to mind is kind of an odd choice, but it's the person I met when I crashed that wedding who became a boyfriend, who this relationship did not end well. And we are not on good terms now. I hate it. I was gonna ask you when the podcast was over, what happened? Yeah, yeah, yeah. But we have so he went from boyfriend to friend to then business partner, um, to then former business partner, but still friend, and now not so much a friend. Um, yeah, things went a little south, and I think he either changed as a person or it became or it came to light, a lot of things came to light about who he really is, and it just did not align with who I am in a fundamental way. And so I cut off communication um with this person. But um he lives his life in a very spontaneous, kind of free way, works for himself and is able to do business sort of from wherever. And I used to be quite a little bit more rigid. I like to plan things out, I like to know what was coming. And that was why when I got separated, it kind of threw me through a loop because I thought, well, wait a second, like I had everything planned out and now it's happening. And spending time with this person were like you didn't know what you were gonna do the next day, but it was like the best way possible. Yeah, it made me realize just how much life there is to experience when you just stop planning and you start living in the moment. And I think that helped me really grow my Mescal knowledge and my passion for Mescal was because I didn't really know what was coming. I just knew that I really loved it. And follow your intuition and exactly. It was kind of a fundamental shift in my life where I just was exposed to people that live a different kind of life, a different mentality, a different approach. Um, it was so fun and so freeing. And I just thought, wow, like this is where it's at.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah, I love that.
SPEAKER_06:And it really put me like in a different frame of mind, a different mentality, and it led me to this amazing place that you know who knows where it's gonna lead me. I still don't know. Yeah, but it's the unknown is kind of the fun part of it, and that used to terrify me, and now I find that exciting. I love that.
SPEAKER_02:Amazing. Yeah. And I I'm a firm believer in I don't know if I believe in forever loves. I I believe in multiple loves. I've had I've loved multiple people and I've had relationships that served a time and a place, and I am a smarter, more well rounded, and and a more empathetic person because of them. And I'm really grateful for all of the loves that I've had and all of the relationships that I've had. Even a person who's had some traumatic and and and and and uh really um unhealthy relationships um that I've now uh worked through some of those things. I was like yeah my trigger um but I'm grateful for that because it also makes me empathetic to others and other situations and anyway I'd say my teacher really has been travel and coming from being young and alone that was my greatest teacher that was my greatest gift that I gave myself um the confidence to rely on myself and even when things went wrong the confidence to get out of bad situations or to survive and to surpass things that didn't go as as um my naive you know wild eyed little baby. I like your answer. So I think travel and I keep doing that and I keep and I share that with my partner of having those experiences of going places together. I'm the planner ahead of time. I do all the investigations I do all this and then when we arrive places of like this is where we need to go you need to figure out how do we get there or this is like the vibe of like I'm trying to here's some choices you figure out the logistics of like getting us from A to B. Yes. Because the macro done it got us across the country. Like we did 17 hours on a plane to get here now you go. So that's the fun part of of not doing alone too of being able to just like step back and enjoy the work that I've put forward to landing.
SPEAKER_04:I love that answer. A great answer it's awesome.
SPEAKER_02:So yeah cool that's the vibes. Well fun day Sunday fun day yeah any last before are we vibes? Cool?
SPEAKER_06:Yeah good um any projects or any things that are in the horizon for you um that we can well I love that you asked that I um and I so appreciate you having me and it's really amazing chats with you. Oh that's so sweet. It's just so nice to be able to highlight these brands because you know I've not chosen um an easy path by any means because I work with these tiny brands that are having amazing amazing products and can't necessarily support me in a lot of ways in terms of growing the brands and getting them out there. So being able to talk about them anywhere is so fun but I think really great because at the end of the day I'm here to help these really small brands and I hope that through my tiny little platform I'm able to like fight against the tequilization of Mescal and give a platform to these really wonderful families that have this heritage that I hope we can continue to maintain. And so I did just launch these two family producer owned brands from Oaxaca Pasion Ancestral that we just tasted enjoying right change visa life. And another one called Gosona which I tried with you at at Duke's exactly really really cool boutique liquor store. Yeah both really wonderful um brands that I was friendly with before we started talking business. So it's really amazing um they're just so thrilled to see their bottles like in bars and restaurants and stores on this side of the world. I think it's just a dream for them. So that's sort of what motivates me. So I'm focusing on on getting those two brands off the ground and then I might be bringing in speaking of Jalisco a rice ya next year. I don't I don't want to like talk over you so can you tell us what Ricea is oh yes well it it in a short way you could say it's Mescal from Jalisco. Okay. Um made closer to the coast um it has its own denomination of origin now um that was created just a few years ago um but because the charroir is so different and the production process is slightly different the roasting of the agabes is different it does have like its own vibe and there's typically racia from the coast and racia from the mountains could have like sort of two categories within the racia world um but uh it's delicious um I'm actually talking to two different brands and one is made by woman and owned by woman and it was really unexpected. So is this D E I feel like I'm on a date right now like I'm chaperoning a date right now like rained in my girl um you know I don't really you know I'm a one woman company and I have a full-time day job so I do not have the capacity to do more. I have 33 different bottles in the portfolio and eight different brands currently but I have no self-control and when it comes to really good people making really good things that is different I just I just can't say no. And so I'm gonna find a way. So that is on the horizon but probably more like mid to late 2026 at this point. But for now hopefully I can do the the current brands and my portfolio some justice and and get them out there. Launching to new in different states. So I'm in 10 different states currently just launched to Alaska and Puerto Rico. So I'm covering both extremes all right all right all right I know I was there in June I missed I did not make it to a concert I wish so sorry no listen we'll have our own private concert turn the mics off.
SPEAKER_04:Yeah exactly a pleasure thank you so much so for chatting with you ladies yeah I'm yeah I've been fangirling I know she is fangirling I think I think even like at one point I looked over and her mouth was just open like like a total crash and it's adorable.
SPEAKER_06:Well if you guys could see this it's a woman Mescal drinking buddies so I think this is just the beginning of a really fun friendship.
SPEAKER_02:I love that potential everyone enjoy their day um thank you so much Julia for hanging out with us and um answering all of my my nerdy I know it's a terrible I love it I'm really thank you both for having us thank you so much to a bunch of stuff in the page in the notes all right all right peace out all right bye bye happy end of summer hands are
