Blanco Tequila

Blanco tequila is bottled within two months of distillation and usually within days, with no time in oak. What you taste is the raw material and the process: how the agave was cooked, how it was milled, how the fermentation was managed and how the distiller cut the heads and tails.

Expect cooked agave, citrus peel, white pepper and a mineral, sometimes briny finish. Brick-oven agave leans sweet and roasted; autoclave or diffuser production tends to read cleaner and more neutral. Because there is no barrel to hide behind, Blanco is the fairest way to judge a distillery.

It is also the most versatile bottle on the shelf — the default for margaritas, palomas and highballs, and increasingly the pour tequila drinkers reach for neat.