Lalo, a new top-shelf Austin tequila, reflects shared tastes of Texas and Jalisco

Jalisco and Texas share a long history of tequila culture. 

Since the 16th century, Jaliscienses have made the strong drink from the starchy blue agave plant that grew in their western Mexican state.

For their part, Texans drank it, especially during Prohibition. That's when the Rio Grande border served as a point of exchange for any type of alcohol, even though tequila back then carried with it an unfortunate notoriety for being cheap, harsh and overly abundant. 

Small groups of tequileros employed pack donkeys and horses at low-water crossings to move the product by night to Anglo bootleggers or middle men. 

"The tequileros traveled through Zapata, Starr and Jim Hogg counties to Duval County and a main distribution point — San Diego," the Handbook of Texas tells us. "From there, cars transported the liquor to major cities — San Antonio, Corpus Christi, Dallas and Houston — throughout Texas."

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To say the least, tequila's prestige has improved considerably since then.

During the past few decades, Texans have been drinking more from a vast variety of tequilas, including the aged reposado and añejo varieties.

And, since the late 1980s, they have taken to top-shelf premium sipping tequilas, such as Don Julio, named after Julio González Estrada, a man who purchased his first tequila distillery in Jalisco at age 17.

The Don Julio brand, which grew out of a private family stash distilled for a business anniversary party, set the tone for other premium tequilas.

Now his grandson, Eduardo "Lalo" González, has teamed with two friends, David Rodriguez Carballido and Jim McDermott, to create and distribute Lalo tequila, a very different, more modern premium brand that has already caught on in restaurants, bars and clubs across Texas.

Very recently, it has become available in liquor stores as well at a retail price of $46.99.

Based in Austin, but distilled, of course, in Jalisco, Lalo is no fly-by-night celebrity brand. It was conceived in Mexico by Mexicans for Mexicans. Like Don Julio, it grew out of a special batch of tequila made for friends and family.

When those friends and family extended their personal lives to Austin, where David and Jim live in Tarrytown, what had been reserved for insiders, with its distinctive low, streamlined Lalo bottle, is now more widely available to the public.

Its light, soft, clean, slightly sweet taste goes particularly well in cocktails, so I've included a few recipes here, as well.

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Growing up in Mexico and Texas

One of the owners, Eduardo "Lalo" González, 31, was born in Guadalajara, Jalisco, to Eduardo González García, who had taken over his father's tequila business, and Carmen Güitrón Zepeda.

He remembers being well-behaved as a student who was avid about soccer and made average grades at a religious Guadalajara school. Gradually, Lalo learned the basics of his grandfather and father's tequila business culture.

"My father traveled a lot," Lalo recalls. "He'd encouraged me to come on business trips. At the distillery, he'd explain the process and how to see a project through. He'd say even early on: 'Don't be afraid to tell your story. Your story is important and you should be proud of it'."

Lalo heard many stories on Fridays when his family gathered for regular long lunches. He'd visit, too, with his grandfather, Julio González Estrada. 

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"I remember he'd sit in an armchair watching the news at 1:30 p.m.," Lalo says. "We chatted about the news. Then we'd go to lunch at 3:30 p.m. As a child, he wasn't able to go to school. He started working at 7."

During the 1920s, Julio González Estrada began work life as a janitor at a small distillery in Rancho El Salvador, Jalisco, a rural hamlet. In 1942, he bought his own distillery, El Salvador. Then when he turned 22, he bought the distillery, La Primavera, in Atotonilco El Alto, and he continued production there.

Jim interrupts: "At age 17, he already had 10 years experience in the business."

David follows: "And he was still underage."

During two interviews in Austin, it was not unusual for the three partners in the Austin-based Lalo firm to finish each other's sentences.

While David, also from Guadalajara, is married to Jim, who grew up in Austin, Lalo is newly married to Regina González. That couple recently moved to Austin, so, although they still travel considerably for business, all three partners now call Texas home.

Back when they were youths, David attended the academically respected Colegio Alemán de Guadalajara, also known as the German School. At around age 14, he met Lalo at parties, but he didn't get to know him better until after he was 19 and living in the Marais district of Paris. There, Lalo arrived with a brigade of friends from Mexico to stay with one of his housemates.

"They were supposed to be there for New Year's Eve, but they started to hang out longer," David recalls. "At one point, I said: 'You guys have fun. I'm leaving. I've got to go sleep somewhere else.'"

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Back in Mexico, David worked for a public relations company and was put in charge of a Cuervo tequila account. It was not long before he worked exclusively for Cuervo, which, coincidently, had purchased Don Julio from Lalo's family. At age 21, he was already brainstorming non-tequila products for Casa Cuervo.

David: "Lalo and I were still friends."

Lalo: "In fact, he was inviting me to Don Julio parties."

From Mexico City, David was helping Cuervo develop Don Julio 70, a limited edition tequila aged in American white oak. Around this time, Davíd realized that he needed to conceptualize a tequila brand apart from Cuervo.

He approached Lalo, who came from a tequila-making family. Who would be the brand's ideal customer? What colors would be used in the packaging? Would they associate the brand with certain celebrities?

By 2016, David said: "No matter what, I'm doing a tequila."

Little did he know that his personal life would soon change drastically.

"I was visiting a friend in San Miguel de Allende," his future husband, Jim, says. "David had just opened a concept store. We hit it off really fast and went on extended dates. We couldn't get too much time together."

David, at the time, was in the closet.

Jim, nine years older than David, was already hearing about the Lalo project. Described as a serial entrepreneur, Jim, who grew up in Oak Hill and New Hampshire, co-founded and sold his first successful business when he was a college student.

During the next 20 years, Jim specialized in start-up and turn-around operations across multiple industries. Among his successes was Rhythm Superfoods, a vegan snack food company that sells through Whole Foods nationwide. He was known to the public, too, through two other high-profile projects, the Belmont music venue and the Tavern restaurant. 

Some of his entrepreneurial sense might have come from his mother.

 "My mom started out as a part-time secretary," Jim says. "And she ended up co-owning with the CEO the company where she worked."

Two historic premium tequilas from the same family

The origin story for Don Julio, the original premium tequila, is hard to resist. In 1987, after 45 years in business, Lalo's grandfather suffered an aneurysm and subsequently retired. To cheer him up, Lalo's father put together a 45th anniversary dinner party that came with the special-edition tequila that became Don Julio.

"They put the bottles in the middle of the tables," says Lalo, who wasn't born until 1989. "My father said, 'Hey, I want to do something to honor my father, but also to honor the agave.' It was so well received, he launched it as a public brand and went out through the U.S. and Europe to tell his story."

Lalo learned that his father created personal relationships with restaurant owners and managers wherever he went. "He was crazy passionate about tequila and what it could become," Lalo says. "And telling stories."

Lalo's father even moved to Kentucky to study the whiskey-making process. He wanted to know the entire cycle of each whiskey brand. By the late 1980s, he had both the know-how and the personal drive to launch Don Julio.

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Thirty years later, Lalo, the tequila, was born at a big Guadalajara wedding in March 2017. 

"We wanted to make something for friends and family," David says. "We thought: 'What would we want to drink?' We agreed on the short bottle with a refined, clean look that allowed guests to talk over it on the table. For the neck, we chose the blue and gold colors of the Jalisco flag. After the wedding, we sold it at cost to friends."

"It was partially to honor my father," Lalo says, "since we share the same nickname."

Eduardo González García died a month later in April 2017.

Lalo also put a good deal of thought into the bottle design.

"A lot of tequila comes in recognizable bottles, but they tend to be very traditional," he says. "We wanted a timeless, contemporary design but with traditional details."

David: "It represents modern Mexico."

'We are connecting cultures'

Tequila is tequila, right? As Mexicans have known for a long time, and Texans have been discovering, not so much.

The emphasis on aging techniques for añejo and reposado varieties attracted American palates, in part because they resembled whiskey. 

Lalo, on the other hand, is a blanco, the youngest of the bunch.

"It's about respecting the agave," Lalo says. "The plant is not like corn or wheat or potatoes. It is not harvested every year. Agave is harvested every seven years. We honor that seven-year cycle. By choosing to produce it without aging, without additives, we can't hide anything. It is honest."

The Lalo agave is planted and harvested in los Altos, the well-drained highlands. In the lowlands, an earthy, mineral taste comes from the volcanic soil.

"There is less available water in the highlands" Lalo says. "So the agave fights more for the water. It gets bigger with a higher concentration of sugars. Therefore, it is fruitier, sweeter."

After deciding to launch the brand quietly, the business partners started to place it where they connected socially — Josephine House in Clarksville, Hotel St. Cecilia in South Austin, Suerte in East Austin.

"It was slow at first," Jim says. "We used no advertising."

"We introduced it at places where we liked to hang out," David says. 

"We were connecting cultures," Lalo says. 

"More than that, we are reintroducing an authentic Mexican culture here," Jim says. "Some wealthy Americans go to Mexico and say, 'Bottle this up and put my label on it.'"

"It is not by accident, however, that we are here,"  David says. "It is now by and for our Austin and Texas friends, too. People here were asking for it, for something that, at first, money couldn't buy. We could never have launched this anywhere else. We felt the support of the community. We were welcomed here so fast."

Michael Barnes writes about the people, places, culture and history of Austin and Texas. He can be reached at mbarnes@statesman.com.

Lalo cocktail recipes from across Texas

Paloma

2 ounces Lalo

1 1/2 ounce hand-squeezed ruby red grapefruit juice

1/2 ounce simple syrup

1/2 ounce hand-squeezed lime juice

Topped with Richard's Sparkling Rainwater

Pinch of salt sprinkled on top, lime wedge garnish

— From Josephine House, Austin

Veracruz

1 1/2 ounce Lalo

1/2 ounce agave

3/4 ounce hand-squeezed lime juice

3 slices cucumber, muddled

6 mint leaves

Top with Squirt grapefruit soda

Combine Lalo, agave, lime, cucumber and mint in mixing tin. Muddle. Add ice. Shake and strain into grapefruit-habanero salt rimmed rocks glass. Garnish with cucumber ribbon.

— From Cuishe Cocina Mexicana, San Antonio

Ancho Rosa

1 1/2 ounce Lalo

3/4 ounce Ancho Reyes Poblano liqueur

1 ounce blood orange juice

1 ounce hand-squeezed lime juice

1/2 ounce simple syrup

— From Potente, Houston

The Skinniest Margarita

2 ounces Lalo

1/2 ounce Ferrand Dry Curacao

1 ounce hand-squeezed lime juice

Garnish with dehydrated lime wheel

— From Muchacho, Dallas