Aguardiente Curado de Huajintepec

Ingredients

Equipment Needed

• •2-liter clear glass jar with a tight lid
• •Fine-mesh strainer
• •Manta de cielo (cheesecloth) for the final strain
• •Clean glass bottles for storing the finished curado
• •Jícaras (gourd cups) or caballitos for serving

Instructions

1. 1

   Rinse the jamaica

   Tip the jamaica into a colander and rinse it under cool running water, tossing it with your hand. The dried flowers come off the drying patios carrying dust and the odd bit of grit, and you want that gone. Rinse, don't soak. A soak starts pulling the color out before the aguardiente gets its turn, and the aguardiente should do that work.

2. 2

   Break up the piloncillo

   Chop the piloncillo cone into small pieces. It is hard as a brick, so lay it on a cutting board and go at it with a heavy serrated knife, or wrap it in a towel and crack it with a mallet. The smaller the pieces, the faster they dissolve in the jar. Leave it whole and you will still find a lump of it sitting at the bottom three weeks from now.

   If the cone will not give, warm it 15 to 20 seconds in the microwave or a few minutes in a low oven. It softens just enough to chop.
3. 3

   Load the jar

   Put the rinsed jamaica, the chopped piloncillo, the canela stick, and the allspice if you are using it into a clean 2-liter glass jar. Use glass, not plastic. The aguardiente is strong and it sits for weeks, and plastic gives the curado a taste you do not want anywhere near it.

4. 4

   Pour the aguardiente

   Pour the aguardiente de caña over everything until the jar is full and the jamaica is well covered. The cane spirit is the spine of this drink, not a base to be drowned, so do not cut it with water and do not reach for rum thinking it is the same thing. It is not. Seal the jar tight and give it a good shake.

5. 5

   Macerate three weeks

   Set the jar somewhere cool and dark, a cabinet or a pantry shelf, off the counter and out of the sun. Leave it two to four weeks. Three is the sweet spot. Every couple of days, shake it or turn it over to move the piloncillo and the color around. Watch the spirit go from clear to pink to deep garnet as the flowers bleed out. That waiting is the recipe doing its work. No me vengas con atajos.

   Taste it at two weeks. If you want it deeper and rounder, leave it longer. A curado does not spoil while it macerates. It only gets better.
6. 6

   Strain and bottle

   When the color and flavor are where you want them, set a fine-mesh strainer lined with manta de cielo over a bowl and pour the curado through. Press the jamaica gently with the back of a spoon to get the last of it, then let it drain. Discard the spent flowers and the canela. Funnel the strained curado into clean glass bottles and seal.

7. 7

   Serve at the fandango

   Pour it neat into jícaras or small caballitos, room temperature or just barely cool from the pantry. No ice, no mixer, no salt rim, none of that. This is a sipping spirit, the way it is poured in Huajintepec when the chilena is playing and somebody is up on the artesa. Recetas probadas y garantizadas.

Chef Tips

• •Aguardiente de caña is the whole drink, so do not compromise on it lightly. In the Costa Chica it comes straight off the trapiche, sold simply as aguardiente or caña. Outside Mexico it is hard to find, and the closest stand-in is a clear unaged cane spirit or a good cachaça. That is a compromise, not an upgrade. Do not use vodka or a white rum filtered down to nothing, because you lose the cane funk that makes it aguardiente in the first place.
• •Buy your jamaica where it moves fast, a Mexican mercado or a tienda with turnover. The flowers should be deep wine-red and a little pliable, not faded brick that crumbles to dust in your hand. Old jamaica is weak jamaica, and a weak flower makes a thin, pale curado.
• •Piloncillo, not sugar. The molasses still in the cone is the flavor. It rounds out the tartness of the jamaica and gives the curado its dark edge. White sugar just makes it sweet and flat, like cough syrup. There is a reason the women in Huajintepec keep a stack of conos on the shelf.
• •For the tamarindo version, swap the jamaica for about 250 grams of tamarind, the sticky pods shelled and pulled apart, seeds and all, and add an extra third of a piloncillo cone because tamarind is more sour. Macerate the same way and strain out the seeds at the end.
• •For the durazno version, swap in 4 or 5 ripe yellow freestone peaches, washed, sliced, pits removed, and keep the canela. It is nearly summer now, so the duraznos are about to hit the highland markets, that is the season for it. Because the fruit is wet this curado is gentler and will not keep as long, so refrigerate it after straining and drink it within two months.

Advance Preparation

• •This is built on time, so start it three to four weeks before the fiesta. A curado rushed in a few days tastes like spiked agua de jamaica, not the real thing.
• •The jamaica and tamarindo curados are high in alcohol and sugar and keep for months in a sealed bottle in a cool dark place, only deepening as they sit. The durazno curado carries fresh fruit and water, so strain it after three weeks, refrigerate it, and drink it within two months.

Frequently Asked Questions

Nutrition Information

1 serving (about 45g)