My Greatest Moment with Tequila by Tom Estes

by  Administrator on Mon Sep 24, 2007

    Belgravia London is a posh place and maybe a bit boring. I, the Ambassador of Tequila to the European Union, am in the residence of the Ambassador of Mexico to the U.K. Classic art is dominating the four-meter tall ancient oak-paneled walls. A distinguished crowd is present to participate in the launch of a tequila activity. It is May 2006. Belgravia has become a little less boring as the tequila flows.    When I realize that tequila, the “bad boy” of spirits, has arrived at this status, I am amazed. I think to myself, “Wow, tequila has come a long way from the dusty back lands.” I realize that this is “My Greatest Moment with Tequila.”
    The first time I ever drank tequila was in 1960. This was pre-Beatles and pre-hippies, and the U.S. still had segregation (which in South Africa was called apartheid, bringing that country to a radical change).

    It was Easter week vacation when kids left home for the beach and were partying non-stop. We sat in Tommy Harlan’s ’57 Chevy hot rod and drank from a 25cl bottle, one of those skinny, long bottles that have never come in from seeming odd and foreign, other worldly, south of the border, dangerously worldly.

    I still remember the thrill of breaking the law, 15 years old being 6 years short of the legal drinking age. I remember the taste. How does one describe tequila’s unique flavour? It tastes like dust with a little smoke, sun, and life hanging in the ganglion of the afternoon air. Nothing like it in the world.

    From then on, I was hooked on tequila. Since being a kid, I had developed a link, a love for Mexico. I think it was that Mexico always seemed so real, so down to earth while life north of the border was so far from real, so Disneylandesque, so Hollywoodfake.

    I went regularly south of the border to Ensenada in Baja California, mecca for surfers, blue water sailors and other non-conforming misfits. Avenida Ruiz is home to Hussong’s Cantina, my favorite bar on the whole Pacific coast. A couple doors down was Licores Gloria where I’d go and see the owner Raphael. I’d ask him, “What’s the best tequila? What should we drink?”

    He’d say, “Orendain Ollitas” and we’d share a bottle, again one of those skinny, long 25cl ones, just like at Easter Week. We’d hide in the back of the liquor store so as not to get in trouble with the policia, always a good idea. Ollitas was 100% blue agave tequila and a reposado, sublime and smooth.

    One of the times I entered Licores Gloria, I asked my customary question. Raphael replied, “Herradura Reposado.” I said, “Hey, why not Ollitas?” He said that someone had told him that Herradura was better. We tried it and the two were not the same. Herradura was much more forward with heaps of full on agave and earth flavours. This was circa 1965.

    Some years later in 1990 in Tequila town, Phil Bayly, my partner in crime and long-time mate, went to a bar called La Capilla. I was speaking to owner Don Javier and was comparing Orendain Ollitas tequila which was painted in a giant mural on the façade of the bar with Herradura reposado which he was serving as house pour. Don Javier told me he found Ollitas feminine in taste and Herradura masculine. This has stayed with me all these years and I use the terms masculine and feminine to train bar staff on knowing their tequilas.

    Don Javier and his bar have become world-famous as the soul place to go when in tequila country. Talk about real with no pretense, Don Javier is loved. He stirs his drinks with a butcher knife or old fork, whatever he has at hand.

    The first shot of tequila I ever sold was in 1976 in Café Pacifico, Amsterdam, right on the border of the red-light district. It would have been the 17th of September, the first night we were open. Two Spaniards came in and bought a shot of Sauza Silver, and I couldn’t I could actually make money by opening a bottle and pouring it in a glass.

    Since then we at Pacifico, including Phil Bayly’s Pacifico in Sydney, have served hundreds of thousands of liters of pretty good and really fine tequilas. We have served over 7 million margaritas, the world’s most popular cocktail.

    Currently we in London in Pacifico and the La Perla bars are selling a tequila called Collecion. This is a rare and expensive tequila made by Casa Cuervo. We sell it for 125 British pounds a shot. That’s nearly 50 pounds a centiliter, the shot being 3.5cl. I was amazed when we sold the first shot. One hundred fifty pounds almost seems more like an investment. The first two takers were female, by the end of the first week on sale we’d “brokered” five shots. Now to date we’ve sold over 800 shots and counting.

    My next Greatest Moment with Tequila will be in October of this year when we will present a Tequila All Stars Road Show on the private island of the Ricard family (of Pernod Ricard) in the Mediterranean Sea. This will be an unprecedented event with tequila luminaries from Mexico and around the world. Phil Bayly will be there telling about the/his Aussie tequila experience.

    It feels to me like it is tequila’s time. It has arrived and continues to arrive in its place as the “nothing like it in the world” spirit. I’m sure there are more “Grandest Moments with Tequila” to come for me.


    Tomas Estes is the founder of Café Pacifico and La Perla Bar,
    London , Paris , Amsterdam and Sydney
    He can be reached at
    This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

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