While our friends were getting ready for Cinco de Mayo parties—a.k.a. “how much tequila can you drink in one evening, in a small New York City apartment or cramped Mexican restaurant?”—we were enjoying the lovely view from THE NIBBLE’s conference room while sipping memorable tequila with the international business director of Tequila Herradura.

While some 1,300 different tequila brands are produced by Mexico’s 146 distillers, only a handful are exceptional. If your palate demands the best—the smoothest and most complex—look no farther than Herradura. It is so well made that the blanco (silver)—the unaged expression that is typically recommended only for mixed drinks—is a beautiful sipping tequila.

In the case of Herradura, which ages its tequilas twice as long as government regulations require, in new American oak barrels, even the typically unaged silver/blanco is aged for 1 and a 1/2 months (this imparts a slight yellow tinge to a type of tequila that is usually clear). It’s one of the practices that makes a great tequila.

RECOMMENDATION: Get yourself a bottle (it retails for about $35) and start sipping snifters of fine tequila. Using a snifter instead of a shot glass focuses the wonderful aromas. Point your nose to the middle of the snifter top.

We enjoyed all four expressions of Herradura tequila. We started with the silver (or blanco, aged 45 days; enjoy with appetizers), and each expression got better and better: the reposado (aged 11 months; enjoy with fish and chicken), the añejo (aged 2 years; enjoy with moles and other sophisticated dishes) and the extra-añejo (Selección Suprema, aged four years; enjoy sipping, like a fine Cognac or aged rum).

When tequila makers take shortcuts to get their products to market faster (in order to get paid faster), the resulting practices create tequila headaches:
1. Not waiting a full 7 years for the agave plant to mature.
2. Not trimming all the leaf parts away from the piña (the heart of the plant that is used to make tequila), thus incorporating bad juice from the leaves.
3. Using chemicals for faster fermentation.
4. Cooking the piña too quickly (think of it as microwaving a steak instead of grilling it).

It goes without saying: You’ll never get a headache from Tequila Herradura, just happy memories.