The fastest-growing spirits category in the USA is Tequila/Mezcal. The most popular cocktail is the Margarita. We love tacos, we love tamales. So … can all of that help us as a country learn to love the people who brought us these things we love?

Agave Road Trip is a critically acclaimed, award-winning podcast that helps gringx bartenders better understand agave, agave spirits, and rural Mexico. This episode is hosted by Lou Bank with special guest Alba Huerta of Julep Houston.

Episode Notes

Shout outs to Alvin Schultz, Ben Quasius, Gustavo Arellano and his book Taco USA.

This episode was recorded about a month before the immigration raids in Los Angeles. The government’s violent response to the peaceful protests against those raids is, I think, evidence of what Alba says in this episode.

This Instagram post from my friends at Lost Lore Tequila says everything I’d want to say in a smarter way than I could

At the DISCUS conference a few months ago, I was at a party that was populated by small-brand tasting tables. The one that drew my attention most was the one that was both least visited and most colorful. And my response to everything they were pouring was, Yes, please! But most especially, the White Chocolate/Raspberry Tiramisu whiskey! It’s an artificially inspired episode of Agave Road Trip!

Agave Road Trip is a critically acclaimed, award-winning podcast that helps gringx bartenders better understand agave, agave spirits, and rural Mexico. This episode is hosted by Lou Bank with special guest Linda Sullivan of seynasecreto with wisdom from Al Murphy of Mother Murphy’s Flavors.

Episode Notes

Thanks to Al Murphy of Mother Murphy’s Flavors

Shout outs to the Distilled Spirits Council of the US, Runts, Skittles, Hampden Estates Rum, Elevate Innovation, Non-Alcoholic Phony Negroni, Zignum Mezcal, Ancho Reyes Verde, Mexico in a Bottle, and “Outspoken,” the monthly storytelling event at Chicago’s Sidetrack!

I thought this episode was going to be about blind tastings. And it is. Or, at least, it starts that way. But when you’re talking with Marissa, aka @tequilaencyclopedia , you rarely take as straight a path as you’d expect. So if you want to listen to a conversation about that … or about CostCo … or about the Agavos Awards … or how much I paid Marissa to join me on a trip to 818 Tequila, this episode is for you!

Agave Road Trip is a critically acclaimed, award-winning podcast that helps gringx bartenders better understand agave, agave spirits, and rural Mexico. This episode is hosted by Lou Bank with special guest Marissa Paragano of The Tequiladies.

Episode Notes

Marissa is also a board member of Tequila That Cares, a philanthropic organization bringing positive change to the agave spirits industry!

Shout outs this episode to the Agavos Awards, 818 Tequila, Costco, and Marissa’s dream team, the Boston Red Sox!

Chuck Cowdery was called “the dean of American whiskey journalism” by no less than Robert Simonson in the New York Times. So when I decided more than 250 episodes into this podcast to finally devote one to Mexican whiskey, I naturally invited my celebrated drinking buddy over. It’s (perhaps) the corniest episode of Agave Road Trip!

Agave Road Trip is a critically acclaimed, award-winning podcast that helps gringx bartenders better understand agave, agave spirits, and rural Mexico. This episode is hosted by Lou Bank with special guest Chuck Cowdery and additional wisdom from Ismael Gomez of Laika Spirits, Xaime Niembro of Whisky Juan del Campo and Gracias a Dios Mezcal, Txomin Alcorta of Whisky Prieto y Prieta, and Jonathan Barbieri of Whiskey Maiz Nation!

Episode Notes

Check out The Chuck Cowdery Blog!

Thanks to Ismael Gomez of Laika Spirits, Xaime Navarro of Gracias a Dios Mezcal and Juan Del Campo Whiskey, Txomin Alcorta of Whisky Prieto y Prieta, and Jonathan Barbieri of Whiskey Maiz Nation for the quotes this episode.

You can check out NOM 199 here and to see how the rules for whiskey in Mexico compare to the rules for Mezcal, Tequila, and everything else, check out this spreadsheet.

And if the tangent about feni in Goa got you going, check out Hansel Vaz’s Instagram page and Fazenda Cazulo!

Last episode we contrasted the good done through the consumption of heritage agave spirits with the damage caused by same. This episode, we talk about the damage done by the casual consumption of agave spirits. And coffee. And chocolate. And … well, everything. It’s a casual-destruction episode of Agave Road Trip!

Agave Road Trip is a critically acclaimed, award-winning podcast that helps gringx bartenders better understand agave, agave spirits, and rural Mexico. This episode is hosted by Lou Bank with special guest Linda Sullivan of seynasecreto with wisdom from Xaime Niembro of Gracias a Dios Mezcal.

Episode Notes

Thanks to Xaime Navarro of Gracias a Dios Mezcal and Juan Del Campo Whiskey for the quote this episode.

Shout outs to Palomo Mezcal, Dark Matter Coffee, Chengdu Bistro, Rogue Ales & Spirits, and Chuck Klosterman and his novel Downtown Owl! (But also … go read Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs: A Low Culture Manifesto. Like, now.)

It’s amazing and moving to see mezcalerxs whose lives have clearly improved as a result of the growing interest in agave spirits. But there’s another side to that story – or, really, multiple other sides to it: some good, some bad, and some … well, the jury is still out on those. We talk about those various stories in this episode of Agave Road Trip!

Agave Road Trip is a critically acclaimed, award-winning podcast that helps gringx bartenders better understand agave, agave spirits, and rural Mexico. This episode is hosted by Lou Bank with special guest Linda Sullivan of seynasecreto.

Episode Notes

This episode cover is Courtesy of Slim Pickens! Thanks, Slim!

The episode of “The Hidden Brain” that I was trying to recall is “Relationships 2.0: The Power of Tiny Interactions + Your Questions Answered: Erica Bailey on Authenticity.” So good!

My friends Jen & Adam Murphy have great Instagram feeds, if you’re a gardening nerd or a garden-in-a-cocktail nerd!

Shout out this episode to Jason Cox whose Cinco Sentidos brand of agave spirits is amazing! Equally amazing are his two (count them, two!) brands of Oaxacan rum: Alambique Serrano and Cañada - Aguardiente Oaxaqueño!

Shout out this episode to Mezcal tour guide Randall Stockton and his amazing pandemic program, Feeding Chichicapam!

Shout out this episode to Chuck Klosterman and his novel Downtown Owl! (But also … go read Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs: A Low Culture Manifesto. Like, now.)

When I first started drinking Mezcal, I was told that there were some agaves that couldn’t be farmed — that could only grow wild. And I still here that narrative some two decades later. And it still doesn’t make sense to me. So I did the only logical thing: I asked a farmer.
Agave Road Trip is a critically acclaimed, award-winning podcast that helps gringx bartenders better understand agave, agave spirits, and rural Mexico. This episode is hosted by Lou Bank with special guest Tracey Vowell of Three Sisters Garden.

Episode Notes

If you’re anywhere near Chicago or Kankakee, order your farm-fresh produce (and dry goods like locally grown popcorn, beans, and oats) from Three Sisters Garden!

In my consumer-focused tastings, I tell attendees that one of the big things I hope they walk away with is, they can lead a more delicious life and support a more sustainable ecosystem if they start drinking more than just Blue Weber processed in Jalisco and Espadin processed in Oaxaca – that’s literally 99% of what they drink now, and if they instead drink one of those two eight times out of ten instead of, rounded up, ten times out of ten, they’ll be helping to turn the ship away from the monoculture trajectory. And I ask them to ask their bartenders if they have an agave spirit that isn’t one of those two, so the bartender ask their beverage director to get something different. But … what if we could get the gringx bartenders to make that argument themselves? What suggestions can they make to put the agave spirits industry on a healthier trajectory?

Agave Road Trip is a critically acclaimed, award-winning podcast that helps gringx bartenders better understand agave, agave spirits, and rural Mexico. This episode is hosted by Lou Bank with special guest Linda Sullivan of seynasecreto.

Episode Notes

If you want to listen to that episode about flights, it’s “Mezcals flights or Mezcal cocktails?”

If you want to listen to that episode about biodiverse cocktail Mezcals, it’s “The Best Mezcals for Mixing, According to Agave Road Trip.”

If you’re a bartender who wants to visit agave spirits producers in Mexico who aren’t connected to brands, check out the Tequila Interchange Project!