TOP 10 BEAUTIFUL TEQUILAS
1. Casa Dragones Sipping Tequila
Beautiful inside and out, the special limited edition collaboration between Mexican artist, Gabriel Orozco and Casa Dragones Sipping Tequila is a work of art. The bottles made of crystal, etched with Orozco’s iconic “Black Kites” image, his checkerboard skull, and signed. Only 400 bottles were made and you can only buy them until November (2013).
Casa Dragones makes only one style of tequila, on purpose. Focus. It is 100% Blue Agave Joven Tequila. A velvety feel and a clean taste. Blended by a Maestro Tequilero, it is an extraordinary delicate blend of platinum and extra anejo. It’s leggy, silky, and arcs from light citrus to vanilla to roasted agave to creamy hazelnut finish.
2. Asom Broso Vintage Añejo French Oak Rested 11 Years
This is a lovingly made tequila. Made from 10-year old agave plants, then aged for 11 years, this tequila has been alive for a long time before it meets your lips. It’s oaky butterscotchy complexity sips like an aged single malt. Its color-swirled hand blown bottles are gorgeous.
3. T1 Ultra Fino -Blanco 80 proof
T1 Tequila Uno’s Maestro Taquilero, Gérman Gonzoleés Garrochotegui, has always wanted to create this tequila, ever since his father taught him the ancient craft of tequila making. T1 Ultra Fino-Blanco is clear, crisp and has the fine elements of agave flavor (green, herbal, citrus). It is also gentle with the throat, with no bite. You won’t see people making the “tequila face” when they drink this. This style won five out of five stars and was rated the #1 tequila in F. Paul Pacult’s Spirits Journal list of the top 120 products of 2012
4. T1 Selecto – Blanco 86 proof
The newest addition to T1’s portfolio. It is distilled at a lower temperature to maintain a more full flavored agave taste.
Vanilla, chocolate, almond, with medium oak noted Extra Añejo sits inside the Don Julio REAL silver leaf emblazoned flagon. It’s sweet all around. Crafted from 100% pure Weber agave, 5 to 10 years old, from the highlands of Jalisco, and aged 3 to 5 years in American White Oak, it makes for a beautiful tequila experience.
Named after the vintage Bordeaux barrels in which it is racked, this luxurious añejo tequila is triple-distilled and aged for a minimum of twelve months in order to achieve its smooth, full-bodied taste and rich, dark amber hue. Packaged in an elegant crystal bottle nestled inside a suede-lined black walnut box, Gran Patrón Burdeos is an excellent gift for that agave aficionado in your life.
Read more at their website.
7. Milagro Select Barrel Reserve Reposado
While not nearly as pricey as some of the other beauties on this BN10 list, Milagro is a lovely tequila. It’s a little spicier. The crystal bottle is exceptional, with its sculpted crystal agave awash with the tequila inside. Milagro Select Barrel Reserve Reposado, aged for six months, has a woody, mild agave flavor and a subtle smokiness.
We admit, we have yet to taste the tequila inside this bottle. It’s probably amazing. But this tequila made the list for its bottle alone. Spikey, made of sterling silver inset with diamonds, this Tequila Ley .925 Extra Añejo is the most expensive tequila we know of, ringing in at $3.5 million. Their platinum and white gold, with a central pure platinum emblem emblazoned with artist Alejandro Gomez Oropeza’s “Pasión Azteca,” costs a mere $225,000.
A four-generation-old family recipe, this triple blend of 3, 4, and 5-year old 100% Weber Blue agave tequilas, Tres Quatro Cinco is housed in a graceful El Greco-like crystal decanter designed and signed by Mexican artist Alonso Gonzalez Jr. Only 1000 bottles made.
Silver entwines a heart of glass containing this Reposado tequila. It glows, with a beautiful delicate hue. With green fruit and herbal agave notes, it finishes with a buttery vanilla, lightly spiced with cinnamon and sweet orange. Corazon Maya Añejo and Silver bottles are equally gorgeous.