Viva Agave Silver: NOT TEQUILA? This $20 Agave Spirit Is Worth Buying!

[00:00:00] What if I told you one of the most interesting $20 bottles in the aisle technically isn't tequila at all? This is Viva Agave silver. And instead of trying to compete with all the fancy bottles and marketing stories out there, they took a completely different approach. Make 100% blue Weber Agave spirit in Jalisco and sell it for around 20 bucks. So the question I want to answer today is simple. Is it actually a good budget tequila alternative, Is it worth buying, and is there a reason it's only $20? First off, get something out of the way. It cannot be labeled tequila. It's sold as disillater, the agave or agave spirit. Viva agave's whole philosophy is that there's a big cost involved in getting the tequila designation, certification, compliance, and everything else that comes with it to put that word on the bottle. Their idea was to skip some of those designation costs and still use 100% blue ever agave. Produce the spirit in Jalisco and put the money into what's actually important, what's inside the bottle. And that makes it really interesting to me because I really don't care about the label. I. I really care about the liquid. Viva agave is imported by Tucson imports, the same company that was behind bringing Contra Negra tequila into the United States. Two Sons was founded in 2015, and they expanded into Viva Agave products in 2019. So this isn't someone who just woke up yesterday and decided to throw an agave spirit in a cheap bottle. This also isn't a brand new brand that has decided to jump on the tequila bandwagon. This tequila was actually founded back in early 2000s, and I've seen some records where it was sold in Mexico around 2011 as an agave distillate. So I talked to Nick the other day on the phone, one of the owners, and we had a good conversation about how it's made. The agave is coming from the area in the valley. It is sourced from independent families. They say they're allowing the agaves to grow fully mature, so waiting as long as they can to have the maximum amount of sugars coming from the plant. Once those agaves are harvested, they are slowly cooked. They're ran through a roller mill. They utilize open fermentation, wild fermentation, and is twice distilled. And they proof it down to 40 or 80 proof. It is unaged and unfiltered. And the crazy part is you can find this for 19.99 in a full liter. You know, we watch tequila prices really start to go up as this excitement around the tequila brands has grown. And now we're starting to see the opposite direction, where the economy's changed and people are looking for budget bottles versus those 50 or 60 bottles. So today we're going to taste it and see if it really fits into that Kelly tequila that you could buy to bring home and sip on it. Okay, let's put it in glass. You know, for some reason, bartenders like them screw tops. I'm okay with them. Again, I think I mentioned sporty abv. I did taste a little bit of this yesterday. I let it open up and when I had my talk with Nick, I kind of wanted to get some information about the brand. So here we go. Let's taste. Let's get on the nose first. I get a nice cooked agave. I get a really nice amount of minerality. Not down to, like petrichor, but definitely some earthiness. Let's. Let's take a taste. A little bit of cooked agave. Nice sweetness, little bit of pepper, the middle as it goes into the finish. Okay, my verdict on this one. Yeah, I'd pick it up. I'd definitely use it for cocktails. I'd probably sip on it a little bit. I do like the sweetness that it has and I do like the minerality that I get in the both the nose and in the flavor. But again, like I said, is it going to knock my socks off as the greatest you've ever had? Absolutely not. It's just a nice agave spirit that would work great in cocktails. They do have a repo and they do have an anejo. I haven't opened those up. I'm excited about giving them a try and see how they go this. You know, if you're wanting to learn about agave spirits, you're not going to learn about this one on the Tequila report, but will learn about all of the great tequilas that are out there. So check out the tequila report at the tequila report dot com. Subscribe 63,000 people get it in your in their email. You should too. So definitely dive into that. Let me know if you've had this. Desato the agave. Viva agave. I want to know if you've had it. I'm interested in hearing your thoughts. Hit that like and subscribe button if you haven't already. Cheers. Have a fantastic night.