Welcome To Wonkette Happy Hour, With This Week’s Cocktail, The Sagebrush Old Fashioned!

Greetings, Wonketeers! I’m Hooper, your bartender. Last week’s Perfect Margarita inspired me to write another tequila cocktail. I wanted something elegant, strong, mature, and a little spicy. And considering that I’m writing this the night of the debates, setting something on fire seemed like a solid choice as well. Let’s grab some anejo tequila and make a Sagebrush Old Fashioned. Here’s the recipe:

2 ½ oz Olmeca Altos Anejo Tequila

½ oz Sugar in the Raw Agave Syrup

1 dash orange bitters

1 dash Tajin

Orange twist

¼ cup mesquite chips

Place the mesquite on a flameproof surface and ignite with a cigar lighter. Place an upended double old fashioned glass over the chips. When the interior of the glass is coated with smoke, remove the glass. Add tequila, syrup, bitters, and one ice cube to the smoked glass. Stir until cold. Strain into a second serving glass with ice. Add orange twist and a dash of Tajin. 

Tequila is one heck of a liquor. Humans will take nearly any starch and turn it into booze — potatoes, wheat, corn, sugarcane, fruit, whatever. Fermenting a 60-pound vegetable, on the other hand, takes some serious effort. This massive, spiky tuber has to be steamed, shredded, and distilled before you get anything drinkable out of it. But the end result is definitely worth it. Raw, unaged tequila — blanco tequila — is an agave bomb, funky and sharp like nothing else in the world of spirits. This is the tequila of choice for most margaritas, and what most of America thinks of as “tequila flavor.”

Aging the spirit in oak barrels for just six months completely changes the character of what you’re drinking. Reposado tequila is honey yellow. The sharp edge of the agave smooths out, and vanilla and toast notes creep in. Cheap reposado tequila is gross, but the good stuff is out of this world. (I will, once again, reiterate that Jose Cuervo Is The Devil’s Armpit Squeezings. Their “tequila” is 51 percent tequila, 49 percent nasty Mexican rum. That’s why it gave you horrible headaches when you were young and foolish. Don’t do it.)

Anejo tequila has been aged at least a year in oak barrels before being bottled and sold. It’s dismayingly hard to find it on the shelves; reposado and blanco tequila are far more popular. But it’s an utter delight if you’re into subtle, layered spirits. It’s somewhere between a good bourbon and a solid tequila in flavor; the scent of agave is very present, but it’s sweet, mellow, and complex in a way that blanco tequila can’t match.

I decided to treat this bottle of anejo as if it was bourbon. A modern bourbon old-fashioned uses a little sugar and bitters to season a quality spirit — I think of it as adding salt and pepper to a steak. A dark agave syrup and a dash of orange bitters make solid replacements for simple syrup and Angostura in a tequila old fashioned. Since we’re in the depths of grilling season, it wasn’t hard to pick up some mesquite chips from the local hardware store and add a little smoke to the drink. (This cocktail follows the same recipe as my Cherry Tobacco Old Fashioned, with different ingredients.) Orange oil from the twist gives the tequila cocktail some fruit notes. Lastly, I couldn’t resist a tiny amount of Tajin to lend some salt, spice, and lime to the tequila. Those three flavors play so well with tequila. It’s almost criminal to omit them from a drink. 

Let’s talk ingredients:

Olmeca Altos Anejo Tequila: Anejo is pricey, but this bottle is affordable while still hitting the notes I want from aged tequila. If you feel like splurging on a more expensive bottle, by all means do so. An “extra anejo” that’s been aged five years or more is a bank buster, but it’s a wonderful treat. Buy this for victory in a spirited debate or just about any celebration.

Sugar in the Raw Agave Syrup: I went looking for dark amber agave syrup here, something with caramel notes that would emphasize the aged character of the tequila. Light agave syrup reminds me of honey; the dark stuff resembles maple syrup. 

Orange bitters: Orange and tequila match up very nicely, so a dash of orange bitters seemed like a nice substitute for the Angostura bitters in a standard whiskey old fashioned. I might be tempted to use a hellfire tincture, but the heat level on those bitters can be variable, and could make the drink unbearably fiery.

Orange twist: Cut a very thin piece of orange peel (no pith) and twist it over the drink. The peel should feel slightly wet after you do this. The orange oils expressed from the peel add more orange flavor without adding acid to the drink. 

Mesquite Chips: Take a small pile of mesquite chips and light them on fire. I find that a cheap cigar lighter does the trick best. The chips burn very readily; when there’s a nice fire going, cover it with an upended glass. The smothered flames will cover the inside of the glass with smoke residue. That thin layer of ash is what we’re trying to harvest from the mesquite. Mix up the cocktail in the smoky glass; stir it well, and then pour the whole thing into a clean glass to serve the drink. Sip and savor. Let’s enjoy the summertime evenings while we can.

Tajin: Rebecca hopping in to add that if you’re a Penzey’s fan (and they are Official Friends to Wonkette), their pico fruta is almost entirely the same thing. You can find Tajin at the grocery store too.

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