Balam Sierra del Tigre

Balam Sierra del Tigre, Ancestral distillation on a Filipino still by Chuy Lapian in Las Agujas (pop. 48, at 5100 ft) in the Sierra del Tigre southwest of Guadalajara. His distillation is as authentic as it gets: like many Jaliscans, he uses a masonry (brick) above-ground oven to roast wild agave inaequidens. The lengthy (23-day) fermentation and single distillation to high alcohol of a single 400-bottle batch yields a raicilla of notable focus and lactic complexity. Big. Lapian has such contempt for modern production methods that he won’t call his distillate raicilla.