Bacanora con Toronja y Chiltepín

This drink is from Sonora. Specifically from the eastern sierra, the ranching country around Bacanora, Sahuaripa, and Arivechi, where the wild agave pacifica grows in the rocky soil and where families have been distilling it in stone-pit ovens for over three centuries. Bacanora is not mezcal. It is its own thing, with its own Denominación de Origen since 2000, and anyone who tells you otherwise has not been to the sierra.

The combination of bacanora, grapefruit, and Squirt is ranchero cocktail logic. Sonora is grapefruit country. The pink toronjas of the Río Sonora valley are juicy and slightly bitter and they were the original mixer for ranch hands who wanted something cold to cut the heat of the desert. Squirt arrived later and got adopted because it carries the same grapefruit signature in carbonated form. Together they do what tonic does for gin: they hold the spirit up without hiding it.

The chiltepín on the rim is non-negotiable. This is the wild chile of northwest Mexico, harvested by hand from August through November in the foothills of the Sierra Madre Occidental, gathered by Comcáac families on the coast and ranchero families inland. One pepper costs more by weight than almost any other chile in Mexico because nobody has succeeded in farming it commercially. It still grows where the birds drop the seeds. Saber cocinar es saber vivir, and saber beber bien también.

This is the desert poured into a glass. Smoke from the agave pit, citrus from the river valley, fire from the sierra. Asi se hace y punto.