Peter Kiley
The tequilero: leads the production side of the partnership.
Our Process · Seven steps
From agave to bottle.
Pedro Furtivo is 100% agave azul from a single estate, certified additive-free. Here is how the agave from the Martinez family estate becomes the tequila: what happens at every stage, how we do it, and why it matters.
Equipment and timings for each step are being confirmed with our production team; what you read here is what we can confirm today.
I. Cultivo y Jima
Step 1: Growing & harvesting
- Blue agave grows for years before it can be harvested. When a plant is ready, the jimador cuts away its long leaves to free the heart, the piña, which is what tequila is made from.
Every piña comes from one place: the Martinez family estate in Ixtlahuacán del Río, Jalisco.
It takes a minimum of six years for agave to reach full maturity; we harvest fully matured agave azul, six to seven years old.
- A mature piña carries more natural sugar and more of the agave’s character, and that is where the flavor of the finished tequila begins.
- 100% agave azul
- 6–7 years
- Single estate
II. Cocción
Step 2: Cooking
- Raw agave can’t be fermented. Cooking the piñas breaks down their starches and carbohydrates into fermentable sugars, and gives tequila its cooked-agave sweetness.
We slowly cook our harvested piñas in large ovens to convert their starches and carbohydrates into fermentable sugar.
The cooked agave then rests for up to 48 hours.
- Slow cooking converts the sugars gently, keeping the rich cooked-agave flavor you taste in every expression.
- Slow-cooked in large ovens
- Up to 48 hours
III. Extracción
Step 3: Extraction
- The cooked piñas are shredded or crushed and rinsed with water to release their sugary juice, called mosto in Spanish. The spent fibers, the bagazo, are left behind.
Our cooked agave is carefully shredded and its juice extracted, creating our mosto.
- Careful extraction takes the sweet juice from the cooked agave without pulling harsh, bitter notes from the fiber.
- Agave juice (mosto)
IV. Fermentación
Step 4: Fermentation
- Yeast turns the sugars in the mosto into alcohol. The yeast, the water and the length of fermentation all shape the flavors that will carry through to the glass.
Our mosto is inoculated with wild yeast and left to ferment for 12 days.
We use deep-well water from the Martinez family land, and some rain water.
Fermentation is open-air.
- A long, wild fermentation develops depth and complexity that a fast one can’t, and the estate’s own water ties the spirit to the place it comes from.
- Wild
- 12 days
- Estate deep well + rain water
V. Destilación
Step 5: Distillation
- Tequila is distilled at least twice. The first run separates alcohol from the fermented mosto; the second refines it, and the distiller keeps only the heart of the run.
Our tequila is double-distilled in traditional pot stills to separate the alcohol from impurities.
Distilled at NOM 1360.
- Pot stills work slowly, in small batches, keeping more of the agave’s body and flavor in the finished spirit.
- Traditional pot stills
- Double-distilled
- 1360
VI. Reposo y Añejamiento
Step 6: Aging or resting
- Blanco is bottled unaged. A reposado rests in oak for at least two months and an añejo for at least a year; the barrels add color and notes like vanilla, caramel and spice.
The same estate spirit is bottled three ways: Blanco unaged, Reposado rested six months in ex-bourbon and ex-Bordeaux barrels, and the Añejo, Edición Exclusivo 1331, aged over a year.
- Time in wood is where the three part ways: bright and earthy unaged, rounder with vanilla and caramel after six months, deep and velvety after more than a year.
- 6 months
- Over a year
- Ex-bourbon, ex-Bordeaux
VII. Embotellado
Step 7: Bottling
- Before bottling, tequila is proofed to its bottling strength with water and filtered. Many brands also add sweeteners, glycerin or coloring at this stage, which the rules allow up to a limit.
Pedro Furtivo is certified additive-free by the Tequila Regulatory Council (CRT): nothing is added to what the agave, water, yeast and wood made.
Small batch, 750 ml: Blanco and Reposado at 40% ABV, the 1331 Añejo at 43% ABV.
How and where we bottle and label: details from our production team coming soon
- Additive-free means the flavor in your glass is only what the estate and the process made.
- Additive-free (CRT)
- Small batch
- 750 ml
Who’s behind it
Three founders, three jobs
Rachel Kiley
The CEO: runs Sneaky Pete Spirits, from the finished bottle to the shelf.
Omar Martinez
Grows the agave azul on the Martinez family estate: step one, and the six to seven years before it.
100% agave azul
Single estate, Ixtlahuacán del Río
Additive-free (CRT)
1360
The bottles
Now taste it
Blanco, Reposado or the 1331 Añejo: pick your bottle.
