This week, luxury spirits brand Clase Azul unveiled their newest expression, Mezcal San Luis Potosí. The ultra-premium Mezcal Joven is the eighth decanter to join Clase Azul’s signature portfolio, dubbed the “icons.”

San Luis Potosí is the third mezcal in the permanent icons collection, and similarly to the two previous iterations (Mezcal Durango launched in 2016, followed by Mezcal Guerrero in 2021), it continues Clase Azul’s tradition of showcasing a different state from the nine denomination of origins (DOs) for mezcal in Mexico (the remaining six are Oaxaca, Puebla, Michoacán, Tamaulipas, Guanajuato and Zacatecas).

“We like to [highlight] regions that are not as well-known outside Mexico,” Viridiana Tinoco, master distiller at Clase Azul, tells Observer. “Most people know Oaxaca as a mezcal distillate, but we want to show the different richness and expressions of the different regions.”

This is why, to date, Tinoco has chosen to release only young mezcal in order to maintain the nuances of the different agaves and their growing regions. “It’s totally different than tequila,” Tinoco says, stressing that only the Weber Azul (or blue weber) can be used to produce tequila, unlike the more than 30 regulated agave cultivars for mezcal. Even though brands can process tequila in different ways, ultimately, “there’s not that much difference in flavor because it’s the same plant, the same region, the........

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