Sevenfifty daily / Why Some producers no longer call their spirits mezcal

Agave Spirits Offer Producers Freedom of Expression 

Ben Scott is the cofounder of Pueblo de Sabor, which imports the highly regarded labels of Mal Bien, Agave Mix Tape, and Lalocura. One Mal Bien expression is certified as mezcal, but the rest of his products are agave spirits. For Scott, the real issue of certification is whether the requirements alter the end product, because the concept of his company is to import bottles that express their makers’ visions. 

Frequently the limits of chemical compounds required for certification just aren’t possible for traditional producers to achieve, such as the naturally-occuring furfural created during the agave roasting process. Producers might have to alter their production methods—as Del Maguey did when the new rules for furfural came into effect in 2018—or water down or blend their spirits in order to meet the official standards. “For us it’s a choice about not changing the product,” says Scott. If regulators changed how mezcal was defined, however, “we’d be happy to certify.”