Destilado de Agave

The mezcal denomination of origin only covers certain states. A palenquero in Michoacán, Puebla, Jalisco or Sonora may work exactly as an Oaxacan maestro does and still be barred from printing the word mezcal.

Those bottles reach the shelf as destilado de agave or agave spirit. The category is therefore not a quality tier — it holds some of the most sought-after ancestral distillates in Mexico alongside plenty of ordinary ones.

Read the back label: agave species, village, maestro and still type tell you far more than the category name does.