Planting, tending, and harvesting the agave plant remains a manual effort, largely unchanged by modern farm machinery and relying on centuries-old know-how. The men who harvest it, the jimadores [ximaˈðoɾes], have intimate knowledge of how the plants should be cultivated, passed down from generation to generation.
By regularly trimming any quiotes [ˈkjotes] (a several-meter high stalk that grows from the center of the plant), the jimadores prevent the agave from flowering and dying early, allowing it to fully ripen. The jimadores must be able to tell when each plant is ready to be harvested, and using a special knife called a coa (with a circular blade on a long pole), carefully cut away the leaves from the piña (the succulent core of the plant). If harvested too late or too early, the piñas, which can average around 70 kg (150 lb) in the lowlands to 110 kg (240 lb) in the highlands, will not have the right amount of carbohydrates for fermentation.
After harvesting, the piñas [ˈpiɲas] are transported to ovens where they are slowly baked to break down their complex starches into simple sugars. Then, the baked piñas are either shredded or mashed under a large stone wheel called a tahona [taˈona]. The pulp fiber, or bagazo [βaˈɣaso], left behind is often reused as compost or animal feed, but can even be burnt as fuel or processed into paper. Some producers like to add a small amount of bagazo back into their fermentation tanks for a stronger agave flavor in the final product.
The extracted agave juice is then poured into either large wooden or stainless steel vats for several days to ferment, resulting in a wort, or mosto [ˈmosto], with low alcohol content. This wort is then distilled once to produce what is called “ordinario [oɾðiˈnaɾio], and then a second time to produce clear “silver” tequila. A few producers distill the product a third time, but several connoisseurs consider this third distillation a mistake because it removes too much flavor from the tequila. From there, the tequila is either bottled as silver tequila, or it is pumped into wooden barrels to age, where it develops a mellower flavor and amber color.
Usually, the differences in taste between tequila made from lowland and highland agave plants is noticeable. Plants grown in the highlands often yield sweeter and fruitier-tasting tequila, while lowland agaves give the tequila an earthier flavor.