Celso García Cruz

Celso has been involved in the family business since he was a child, but it wasn’t until returning from eight years of military service in northern Mexico that he began to dedicate himself full-time to cultivating and distilling maguey. His wife Felipa is also of strong mezcalera heritage, and she and their children help with nearly every batch they produce at their palenque in Lachigüizo. The family works together unearthing the cooked piñas, chopping and mashing the agave, and watching over the old sabino wood fermentation tanks. Celso distills around 1,000 liters of agave every year, working with a diverse mix of Espadín, Bicuixe, Madrecuixe, Pulquero, Tepextate, Tobalá, Tobaziche, Jabalín, and Cucharillo*. Batch sizes range from a miniscule 20 liters to around 400 liters, depending on the quantity and variety of agave he uses.


Soil type: colorada, roja, and cascajo

Oven: 7-ton capacity, conical, earthen oven

Mashing: Machete, axe, and shredder

Fermentation: 5 Montezuma cypress sabino wood tanks. 1000 - 1200 liter capacity.

Distillation: Celso double distills using two different copper pot stills, one with a 250-liter capacity, and the other, slightly larger at 300 liters.

* - Cucharillo is not actually an agave but rather a Dasylirion subspecies.


MARIE NAKAZAWA