The art of making Capón Mezcal
"Capón" denotes a distinctive technique employed in naturally enhancing the agave before harvesting, I like to believe that in the mezcal-producing world, it is an uncommon & delicious batch that is connected with time.
As agave plants mature, they initiate the growth of a shotting their flowering stalk, commonly known as "quiote" in Spanish. It resembles an asparagus but it has a massive size!
Anyway, these stalks, reaching heights from 6 to (you have never seen) x Meters, bear flowers filled with seeds, signaling the plant's reproductive (and final) life phase. However, to conserve energy and redirect it back into the agave heart (piña), the stalk is severed—a process metaphorically akin to castration, hence the term "capón."
The agave life cycle is straightforward: sprout, mature over years (potentially decades), flower for reproduction, and eventually perish. The emergence of a bump atop the agave indicates the impending growth of the quiote. Allowing the quiote to mature would deplete the plant's carbohydrates and energy reserves, hence the necessity of castration to retain these vital resources within the piña for mezcal and pulque production.
