Sofia Partida and her family are one of the 70,000 families in Amatitán, Mexico whose livelihood is dependent upon tequila.
“It is truly a place where the tequila lifestyle has been thriving for so many years now,” Partida said. “My family, because of being from this town, was immersed in the tequila really from since they were young.”
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Partida wasn’t always an authority in tequila, but the spirit has always been in her blood.
“I just fell in love with the tequila lifestyle that my uncle and cousins were leading,” she said. “I was really drawn to the way it was not only their art and their craft but truly their living.”
Despite its proximity to Guadalajara’s cityscape, Amatitán is like “stepping back in time,” Partida said.
Tradition is ingrained in the town’s identity and its customs are embedded in the cobblestone streets. Agave farms are passed down from father to son and the town holds festivals to celebrate the harvest.
“I would say 80-percent of the people that live in the towns of Amatitán and Tequila have something to do with tequila production, whether it’s working in a fabrica on the bottling line or doing some operational job,” Partida said. “It is 100% a thriving culture around tequila.”
After working with her father in Northern California for six years, Partida’s uncle Enrique, who passed away in 2015, moved back to Amatitán and planted agave on the land inherited from his father.
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Today, the farm boasts 5,000 acres and is managed by Enrique’s sons.
While the farm is still Partida family-owned, Edrington takes care of the business side and that’s something Partida sees as an “incredible fit.”
“Edrington is all about quality in the glass and giving their consumers the best,” she said.
And that’s a philosophy Partida stresses because for Partida Tequila, quality helps tell the story.
“It’s really just putting the word out there on what high quality tequila is and how expressive it can be,” Partida said. “It’s a spirit that should be respected, savored and really understood.”
What is Partida Tequila’s story?
This tequila valley, valle del tequila, is a very expressive tequila. If you were going to compare it to a wine, it's the red wine of tequila. It’s an old-world style. Big, bold and earthy tequilas come from this particular region, so that's the story we're telling with Partida. We are hanging onto our history — our roots — developing and producing this beautiful, full-bodied, earthy, agave-forward tequila.
What’s the best way to experience tequila?
I think the only way to understand the characteristics (of tequila) is at room temperature, neat and in the proper glassware. We do it in a Riedel glass. Something with a stem is nice because it keeps the heat from your fingertips away from the glass, so you're not warming the liquid at all. It's got that nice small entry, so that it's concentrating the aromas. So you don't want to do it in a big rocks glass because you might lose the aroma that way. It’s really the only way to understand the character and the story that the tequila's trying to tell you.
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Partida Tequila is referred to a lowland tequila. Why is that?
It’s an elevation thing. The agave in the lowlands of Mexico are grown in a valley at the base of a volcano and there's a lot more rainfall. The volcano has definitely left its mark, so the soil there is a mix of black volcanic stone and that red rich clay.
But the lowlands are not low; the agave is grown at 3,900 feet. The agriculture there has a lot of minerality from that volcanic stone, so you're going to be picking up copper, iron, potassium and silica, all which lend itself to the flavor of the tequila. You're also going to get that vegetal tequila that’s very big in style.
Do you think there will be a time when tequila producers and agave farmers will have to rethink their traditional approach?
In the future, it's hard to say because I believe that it's becoming so modernized these days. You're seeing these trends that we never thought we'd ever see, over distillation, filtering colors out, aging tequila in wine barrels and creating a pink tequila. Flavored tequila's, these things are already happening.
It could get crazy with tequila. That's why, for us, creating a beautiful, authentic, traditional, pure tequila is all we'll ever do. We're purists at heart and we believe that's the way tequila should be enjoyed and savored.