Tequila

Ageing

Ageing as with any other spirit gives time for the wood to interact with the barrel and for the spirit to mellow. During the day as the barrelgets warm with the days heat more spirit is soaked into the pores of the wood and extracts the vanillin’s, tannins and other flavours from the wood. As the wood cools at night it tightens pushing that soaked up liquid out of the wood with all that flavour. Over a period of warming and cooling there is an amount of liquid lost to evaporation otherwise known as the “Angels Share”, this processes is more savvier the hotter the country, this is why you might see a 30yr old whiskey but never a Tequila or rarely a rum as in hotter climates the interaction between barrel and liquid is more intense and evaporation is more making it a far small yield for the work you put in. In essence the hotter the climate the quicker the ageing but it is not quite as simple as that. The age statement on a bottle usually states the youngest spirit in the bottle or the majority spirit but not always. Most spirits are aged in American white oak. This is due to a few simple reasons, for longevity and consistency it holds liquid best and flavours consistently also with the rule that Bourbon Whiskey can only use its barrel once, this means there is a surplus of barrels that are sold on to other spirit producers to age in.