The Tasting Panel magazine

May 2012

Issue link: http://digital.copcomm.com/i/65124

Contents of this Issue

Navigation

Page 6 of 132

Up Front with UP Juan Carlos Arav Fortique by Lana Bortolot Talk about a revolution. Tequila: For years it was the throat-burning fi re water you loved to hate . . . the assured guest at a frat party or an across-the-border spring break bash with the predictable hangover. Then came Juan Carlos Arav Fortique and his Tequila REVOLUCION. Born of French ancestry, reared in Mexico and well-travelled in Europe, Juan Carlos spent a lifetime being exposed to the fi ner things in life. And he knew that tequila could be one of them. Juan Carlos with Tequila REVOLUCION Extra-Añejo. PHOTO COURTESY OF TEQUILA REVOLUCION 6 / the tasting panel / may 2012 "I was a little bit sad to see that there was no quality tequila out there. You could fi nd always the cheap tequila, which gave it a lower image," he tells THE TASTING PANEL. "I decided to produce a tequila, choosing the best raw materi- als possible, in order to show the world a real, good tequila, perfectly distilled." On a mission to "rebel against the ordinary," a concept that serves as the brand's tagline, he launched his line of premium agave tequilas in 1995. Though tequila was emerging as a spirit with potential for more sophisticated positioning, as a category, it wasn't evolving as quickly as the demand. Arav, 54, a former industrial engineer and entrepreneur with a passion for race cars, wine and spirits, saw the unserved market and tapped it. He chose El Arenal in Jalisco, tequila's spiri- tual home, as the site for plantation and produc- tion and built a facility focused on traditional, small-batch production from their own blue tequilana Weber agave. He waits for the plants' seventh birthday before harvesting, when they're giving the optimal sugars and fl avors that distin- guish his juice and its trademark smoothness. But despite the close attention to details— from the way the plants are harvested to its custom-crafted barrel program—don't call this tequila artisanal. REVOLUCION doesn't need a buzzword to stand on its own merits. "Artisanal means you don't have consistency of quality," Arav says. "We are still a niche production, and we take a lot of care in the way we produce and the way we get our fi nal fl avor. We do that without adding any fl avors."

Articles in this issue

Archives of this issue

view archives of The Tasting Panel magazine - May 2012