The Mysterious Palmilla

The non-DO Dasylirion

(Excuse my Spanglish)

The weird world of Dasylirion

Most people in this club have heard about and sipped Sotol in the past. Be it your humble Flor de Desierto or the very specific spirits crafted by someone like Chava Derma in Chorreras, Sotol has been appearing in specialty bars over the last few years. Yet, it is a very confusing category.

Unlike what happens with Agave, the Denomination of Origin that governs Sotol doesn’t cover the names given to the different local names to identify Dasylirion-based spirits. In Agave, you have Bacanora, Mezcal, Tequila, Comiteco, and maybe even Tuxca one day. The name of the spirit is the one being protected and promoted, not the raw material used to make it.

In the Sotol world, you only have a DO that covers “Sotol”, the common name given to the Dasylirion genus, even if you can find different species of this plant all around Mexico with names such as Sereque, Cucharilla, and Palmilla. Only the states of Coahuila, Chihuahua, and Durango can use the word “Sotol”, and every other state is obliged to improvise. Isn’t that super weird? Imagine that only the states wielding the mezcal DO could use the word maguey or Agave on their bottles? Total chaos right?

What exactly is a Dasylirion?

After this initial rant, maybe it is worth defining Dasylirion in a quick, effective way. Just like Agave, it belongs to the Aparagacea family, but it is its own genus, which separated from Agave about 80 million years ago. So yes, Dasylirion is a completely different animal altogether. Many characteristics make them unique, but I’ll list a few basic things that fascinate me.

First, they can sort of live forever. Every producer working with Daysilirions claims these plants can live up to 100 years, and no one has ever told me they’ve seen one die of old age. Sinohe Chacón, this month’s maestro, even told me that he has seen Palmillas in his region that are so old that they sport six heads, all with their respective quiotes.

Which brings me to the second characteristic, they can sprout many quiotes during their lifetime. Unlike agaves that die after a single heroic reproductive effort, Dasylirions can flower almost endlessly throughout their lifetimes.

And third, these plants don’t even need pollinizers because they can be either male or female, in contrast with Agaves, which are hermaphrodite. This means they can exist, almost independently, in the most isolated regions without depending on bats, bees, and, obviously, humans. I could go on, and on with other facts and curiosities, but this would end up being a biblical newsletter, so I’d better stop here.

I started this newsletter by noting that only Coahuila, Chihuahua, and Durango can use the word Sotol on their bottles per the current Denomination of Origin, so this Dasylirion Wheeleri produced in Sonora has to be labeled with its local name, Palmilla. We don’t have an exact story of why they decided to call it this way, but it does look like a small palm tree. So we guess that solves the mystery.

In the town of Bacanora, Yaquiana, used to make the town’s homonymous spirit is king, but, according to Sinohe, there is prime Palmila up in the higher areas of the mountain that can result in very appealing flavor profiles. To this day, his family is the only one consistently producing Palmilla in the region because even though making it shares much of the know-how related to agave spirits’ production, there are important tweaks needed to extract the best that Palmilla has to offer.

One of the things he mentioned during the interview that really caught my eye is that, when fermenting Yaquiana, you can push the fermentation to the very end, converting every last trace of sugar into alcohol. But in Palmilla, that is a complete no-no. The fermentation should always remain “incomplete” to avoid off-flavors overpowering the expression’s overall profile.

The last time we had the chance to visit Sonora, we made a very quick stop in Hermosillo to eat seafood and try the full line of the Chacón’s family spirits. After ordering a massive “mariscos molcajete”, we went through their Bacanora, Palmilla, and Prickly Pear spirits. I thought their Bacanora was solid, but, in my opinion, where they really shone was in the expressions where they had no tradition to respect or follow. As I mentioned before, nobody really works with Palmilla in the town of Bacanora, so they had to improvise and learn, through trial and error, what it takes to make a tasty product. There was no local market, old grandfather, or institution to guide them; they only had their palates and personal preferences. The same is true for the prickly pear spirit (which is included in the box as the bonus bottle), which they started making after realizing those pretty fruits, packed with valuable sugars, had the potential to create a distinctive spirit.

In other words, and this may come as a strange argument, I think this is a release that celebrates innovation. The Chacón family has a long-standing tradition, the plants’ genetic material and the amazing territory to work with, and an intuition that can convert any sugar source into something delicious to sip. I can’t really wait to see what they’ll do next, and I am sure that I’ll get more than full bottles to enjoy.

Sonora’s diversity

One last thing that I would like to mention about this release is that I think it is also a great way to understand that Sonora is not just an endless desert. Some people market Bacanora as the “desert spirit,” but the town that gave it its name is up in the mountains, surrounded by dense, lush greenery. This Palmilla, too, according to Sinohe, likes to grow high up there in the mountain, side by side with big oaks, where it gets chilly enough to kill even your strongest Yaquianas. When trying these spirits, you are not only tasting a completely different genus, but you are also tasting a Sonora that few people have experienced in the flesh.

I really hope you enjoy it, and I can’t wait to hear your thoughts about this rare and delightful spirit.

Cheers guys!

Follow along throughout the month on facebook or instagram to get all the videos, fun facts, and conversations about this month’s feature. Some topics to look forward to include:

• More on how and why they chose to work with prickly pears to craft a spirit.
• The history of Palmilla, before it was distilled, and how it was an important source of food for indigenous groups.
• Sinohe’s theory on why Palmilla can produce more complexity than Agave.