The Story Behind The Picante de la Casa
Mace, a cocktail bar located in New York City’s West Village, takes recipe inspiration from herbs and spices from around the world. So when Tequila Zarpado invited the bar’s very own Evgeny Tolmachev to craft a drink highlighting its limited-edition REAPER tequila, he leaned into the spirit’s natural chile heat, as well as the botanicals that have come to define Mace’s, and Tolmachev’s, reputations.
The tequila is a zippy twist on Zarpado’s refined small-batch blanco, this time infused with the bold expressions of habanero and the Carolina Reaper. Zarpado REAPER is the only tequila in the world to use the pepper this way, hence the name. Famously the world’s hottest pepper, the Carolina Reaper is, of course, spicy but the heat is followed by fruity flavor characteristics. That profile adds to the blanco’s notes of Weber blue agave and pineapple in a way that subtly shifts cocktails towards a fuller, earthy-sweet heat.
Picante de la Casa embodies this expression with panache, using agave nectar to tease out more of the tequila’s bright fruit flavor while incorporating herbaceous and aromatic basil to soften the burn and complement the tropical fruit notes. Without any additional chile tinctures or muddled pepper, the Zarpado REAPER is the star of the show here, and lets its heat speak for itself.
This recipe page is sponsored by Tequila Zarpado.
