I couldn’t find a good clear resource explaining where tequila and mezcal were produced, so I made one! It’s a map! Hopefully you all already know that tequila and mezcal can only be made in Mexico. If you didn’t know that…now you do! But more specifically tequila and mezcal have internationally recognized Denomination of Origin (the same thing that means champagne can only come from Champagne) and must be made in certain states in Mexico. Above is a map I put together showing the different states where both spirits are made. Reds and oranges are mezcal, greens are tequila, and browns are both spirits. The shading is to indicate that only certain municipalities in those states are allowed to make mezcal or tequila. The star is the city of Tequila, which is honestly very near where a lot of tequila is made.

States that make Tequila

Jalisco most tequila comes from here
and municipalities in…
Michoacan
Nayarit
Guanajuato
Tamaulipas

States that make Mezcal

Oaxaca most mezcal comes from here
Guerrero
Durango
Zacatecas
San Luis Potosi
and municipalities in…
Tamaulipas
Michoacan
Guanajuato

Or…how I got to know more about mezcal and all its sister spirits better than the average bartender. I was hired as a bartender, and quickly became the only bartender at an agave focused bar in 2013, right when agave based spirits were beginning to rise in popularity. I now run my own agave focused bar program. A HUGE part of that program is education. Educating the staff, so they can answer the many questions we get from guests who see our back bar and ask “is that all tequila?”.

After spending so many hours looking for information on the internet about mezcal, tequila, raicilla, sotol, bacanora, and finding very little, and even less that was accurate, I decided to start this blog. Hopefully this site can be useful, not just for the bartenders that work for me, but for anyone whose figured out just how amazing agave spirits are and wants to know more.