Tres Papalote Mexicano Mezcal

Tres Papalote is the mezcal brand Riviera Imports launched in 2015 with Cheech Marin as partner and ambassador, with label art drawn from his collection of Chicano art, and the Mexicano is the most serious bottle in the line. It's an artesanal mezcal built around wild maguey Mexicano (Agave rhodacantha), a slow-growing variety that takes years to mature in the wild, blended with espadín, and bottled unaged at 45% ABV (90 proof), well above the 40% of the brand's standard Espadín. Tastings.com scored the 2023 bottling 94 points and a Gold Medal, calling it "large and in charge," with aromas of kimchi, pickled garlic chili paste, grilled sweet corn with charred cob, and salted Marcona almond, then a medium-bodied, dry, crisp palate that adds grilled green apple, salted citrus, sauerkraut, and mesquite, finishing tingling and medium-long. That funky, umami-driven profile is what wild Mexicano does when it's handled well, and it's a different animal from the herbal, citrusy espadín. Drink it neat from a copita to get the whole picture, or put it to work in a Tommy's Margarita or a Paloma where the extra proof and the savory edge hold up against lime and grapefruit.

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