A preachment, dear friends, you are about to receive, on Mayahuel, nicotine, and the temptations of maguey. I’ve heard that all sorts of things in the world of agave spirits are sacred and should be treated with respect. But that begs the question, what does it mean to respect something? Or, more importantly, what constitutes disrespect? We bat that concept around in this unholy episode of Agave Road Trip!

Agave Road Trip is a critically acclaimed, award-winning podcast that helps gringx bartenders better understand agave, agave spirits, and rural Mexico. This episode is hosted by Lou Bank with special co-host Linda Sullivan of seynasecreto.

Episode Notes

The preamble to today’s episode is a shout out to the Beverage Testing Institute’s Top 25 Spirits of 2023 announcement, which landed today. Find it here.

To listen to the episode Chava and I recorded about the cultural heritage of pechuga, click here.

To learn more about nixtamalizing corn to make masa, click here. To learn how Frontera makes tortillas, click here.

“Why Is Chartreuse Hard to Find Right Now? Ask the Monks Who Make It,” Becky Cooper, New York Times, April 14, 2023.

The quote from Nick Hornby that goes something like “I don’t believe in God but want to be the kind of person who would qualify to get into heaven” is from High Fidelity, one of my all-time favorite books. When I went searching for a good link for Nick, I found his Instagram page, which includes an image promoting a TV adaptation of his novel Funny Girl. How did I miss this? And how can I watch it in the USA?

Linda shouts out to Priya Parker, whose mission is to help people create collective meaning in modern life, one gathering at a time.

Some of the crosses I’ve run across at the palenque of Eduardo Angeles of Lalocura: