100% Blue Weber Agave  ·  Atotonilco el Alto, Jalisco (Highlands)  ·  NOM 1120

Siete Leguas is a family-run distillery in Atotonilco el Alto, in the Jalisco Highlands. It was started in 1952 by Don Ignacio González Vargas and has stayed in the family ever since. The name comes from Pancho Villa's horse, Siete Leguas, which translates to "Seven Leagues".

They run two distilleries on the same hill, both under NOM 1120. Fabrica el Centenario is the original, dating back to 1952, and still uses a tahona stone wheel pulled by mules to crush the cooked agave. Fabrica La Vencedora was added in 1984 and is a bit more modern, but the process is still old-school. Brick ovens, wooden-tank fermentation with agave fibres in the mix, and double distillation in copper pot stills.

Most of the agave comes from their own fields. No additives, no shortcuts, just proper tequila made the way it used to be.

Siete Leguas was founded in 1952 by Don Ignacio González Vargas in Atotonilco el Alto. It's one of the older family-run names in tequila and has been making it the same way for over seventy years.

The brand also has a quiet bit of history that not everyone knows. For years, Siete Leguas produced tequila for Patrón in the early days, before Patrón built its own distillery and went its own way. That tells you a fair bit about the quality of what was coming out of Siete Leguas back then, and what's still coming out of it now.

The family has resisted the pressure to scale up, water down, or sell out. The two distilleries on the hill still run side by side. The tahona is still in use at Centenario. The standard hasn't shifted.

The big thing is that they've kept the traditional process going at full scale, not as a marketing gimmick. The tahona at Centenario is still pulled by mules. The fermentation still happens in wooden tanks with the agave fibres in the mix. The Blanco is blended from both distilleries, so you get the depth of the tahona side and the consistency of the modern side in the same bottle.

Add to that:

• 100% Blue Weber agave, mostly from their own Highlands fields
• No additives across any expression in the range
• Family-run since 1952, four generations deep
• Tahona stone wheel still in active use at the original distillery
• The same house that produced Patrón in its early years

If you already know your way around tequila and want a proper Highlands bottle made the old way, Siete Leguas is one of the names that always comes up.

The process is traditional from start to finish, and it doesn't change much from one bottle to the next.

• Agave: 100% Blue Weber, mostly from their own fields in the Highlands of Jalisco
• Cooking: Traditional brick and stone clay ovens
• Extraction: Tahona stone wheel at Fabrica el Centenario, roller mill at Fabrica La Vencedora
• Fermentation: Wooden tanks, fermented with the agave fibres still in the mix
• Distillation: Double distilled in copper pot stills
• Additives: None, at any stage
• Aging: Blanco is unaged, Reposado is rested in American oak, Añejo is aged longer in American oak

Old methods, honest ingredients, no shortcuts. That's the whole point.