Oak-Aged Texas Sotol

Travel Distilled samples the new Oak-Aged Texas Sotol from the Desert Door Distillery

Last year I discovered Desert Door Texas Sotol and loved it, so I’m pleased to see it made available in miniatures, and in a new oak-aged version.

Desert Door’s is a cool story, and you can read about it on my review of their original sotol. The potted version is that three guys met at business school, created a course project to theoretically build a sotol distillery, and later did it for real!

Sotol is mainly made in Mexico, but it isn’t an agave spirit. It’s made from the desert spoon plant which, although it looks like it could be an agave or a cactus with its spiky green leaves, is actually a member of the asparagus family. As well as in Mexico they also grow widely in West Texas… and also in Arizona, where I live. In fact we have one alongside our driveway.

Desert Spoon Plant from which you make the spirit called sotol — Desert Spoon Plant

The Taste of Sotol

Sotol is an unusual taste. When I shared it with my wife and two friends, I was the only one who was enthusiastic. The others thought it was pleasant enough, there was nothing wrong with it, it just wasn’t to their taste and they didn’t ask for a refill. To me it smelled of straw, with a bit of creamy vanilla and light smoke. On the palate it was similar, a taste of the desert on your tongue.

Oak-Aged Texas Sotol

This new release is the original sotol but it’s been put into new American Oak barrels and left to mature for up to a year. The barrels have had what’s described as a medium char. I know what charring is all about as I’ve seen it done and by chance was researching and writing about it earlier today.

Charring Barrels

When barrels are made they can be either toasted or charred, at the request of the distillery which is buying them. Toasting is like making toast, where the bread is close to the heat source but not touching it. Charring is where the inside of the barrel is flash-fired for a short period, typically from about 15 seconds to a minute, so a medium char is probably about 30 seconds.

What charring does is bring out more potential flavors from the wood. Not charring oak barrels means more vanilla/coconut flavors, lighter flavors, and the more you char the more you get flavors like butterscotch and burnt caramel. Of course, how much of these flavors you taste in the spirit depends on how long you leave it in the barrels.

This oak-aged sotol is left for up to one year, which is not a long period but certainly enough for the barrels to make an impact on the spirit. And a positive impact. From a color point of view, it turns the sotol from clear to a straw-like color, like a very young whiskey… just what you’d expect from only one year in the barrel.

On the nose this oak-aged sotol has the straw and vanilla aromas of the original, but also a hint of the caramel from the charred oak. There’s some vegetal aromas in there too, a little like you get from agave spirits, and some sweet spice like cinnamon. I was tasting this with my wife, who was lukewarm about the original sotol, but this oak-aged version she found much more enjoyable. She likes a ‘wee dram’ and compared this to a lighter Scottish whisky, with just a touch of Islay peaty smokiness. It’s also more potent than the original, as it’s 50% ABV rather than 40% ABV, and that’s certainly noticeable when you taste it.

Oak-aged Texas Sotol Cocktails

While I would happily sip this oak-aged sotol neat, or maybe with an ice-cube to slowly soak up that alcohol, I’ve a feeling this will be really good in cocktails. I wasn’t able to experiment as I was only sent one of their new miniatures, so one shot for me and one for my wife used up most of that.

But Desert Door has a lot of recommendations for using this in cocktails. They suggest using it as the spirit in a Manhattan or an Old-Fashioned, or quite simply mixing it with a cola. The Manhattan in the photo certainly looks tempting, and below is the recipe.

Landsman (aka Sotol Manhattan) Recipe

2 oz Desert Door Oak-Aged Sotol
0.25 oz Orange Liqueur (Solerno recommended)
2 Dashes Angostura Orange Bitters
0.25 oz Sweet Vermouth
Orange peel

Fill coupe glass with ice + water to chill. In a mixing glass, add ice and ingredients except vermouth. Stir vigorously. Pour out ice water from coupe glass and add sweet vermouth. Circle around to coat the glass, then pour out excess. Double strain cocktail into glass. Garnish with an orange peel.

Desert Door oak-aged Texas sotol miniatures — That’s my kind of ten-gallon hat!

Available in Miniatures

Desert Door Texas Sotol has also released 50 ml bottles of its popular sotol — both its Original ($1.99) and new Oak-Aged ($2.49) variations — across select retailers in Texas, Tennessee, Georgia, and Colorado.