Colombian Aguardiente has become one of America’s fastest growing spirits, breaking into cocktail bars and Michelin star restaurants from Miami to New York and beyond
Aguardiente, or aguardente in Portuguese, is one of the most vastly used terms for alcohol of various types across the world, or more particularly in Spanish and Portuguese speaking countries from Latin America to the Caribbean to Europe. As a type of spirit that roughly translates to “firewater,” it can basically have a different makeup wherever it comes from. “In Portugal, the EU has demarcated six aguardente producing regions,” explains The Oxford Companion To Spirits & Cocktails. Spain has two regional demarcated examples, aguardiente de sidra de Asturias (an apple-based spirit from Asturias) and a liqueur: aguardiente de hierbas de Galicia (a sweet herb liqueur). It can be made from sugar cane juice, syrup, molasses, or even grapes and it can be found at all sorts of ABVs, anywhere between 20% ABV and God knows how high. Brazil, El Salvador, Mexico, and others all have their own versions and legal definitions of the spirit, but Colombia might make the most distinct and intriguing aguardiente of all, and it could be poised to be the next Latin American alcohol to become a global sensation.
What is Colombian Aguardiente?
Colombian aguardiente, or “guaro” as it’s known locally, is the South American nation’s unofficial national drink–rum is also popular, but you’ll find aguardiente drank basically anywhere you go. In technical terms, it’s a sugar cane-based spirit of between 24 percent and 29 percent ABV flavored with anise.
“You need to have sugar cane juice or molasses, you need to have water and anise. That’s it,” explains Ricardo March, co-founder of Bacan Guaro aguardiente. “It doesn’t tell you the amount of anise that you need to use. It doesn’t tell you the type of sugar cane you can use. You comply with those three things, you have an aguardiente.”
Why is it becoming popular now?
Up until recently, however, Colombian aguardiente hasn’t been of a particularly high quality. That’s because all guaro factories were state-run. “Aguardiente factories in Colombia are not so good because they’re owned by each state, one factory per state, and the governors just sell it in the state,” explains Chef Juan Manuel Barrientos Valencia, creator and founder of the El Cielo restaurant, which has Michelin star restaurants in both Miami and Washington D.C.. So with the profits, they pay schools and other things, but at the end, because they are committed to make cashflow for each government, they’re meant to be mainstream and not a very good product.”
That all changed about 10 years ago, when rum began taking off and started to be created in tax free zones simply to be exported. Brands like Dictador can now be found across the globe and bottles can cost anywhere between fifty and tens of thousands of dollars. Unlike rum, however, Colombian aguardiente is rarely aged, has a versatile flavor, and is low-ABV–a booming category at the moment. It’s also recently begun to see an improvement in quality, particularly when sold outside Colombia.
While the liquid in Colombia is still state-owned, produced, and sold, there is a loophole. It’s one that comes down to the provenance of each piece of the final liquid, which allows producers to create Colombian aguardiente from higher quality ingredients. For March, that means using organic sugar cane juice from Brazil and organic star anise from Spain. And while that might not at first sound very Colombian, he explains that “76% of the total bottle [of Bacan 24] is water,” which he gets from Cali, Colombia and he produces Bacan Guaro with Colombian hands “in a duty free zone.” However, due to previously mentioned local laws, he can’t sell Bacan Guaro in Colombia at the moment. That doesn’t stop it from making it into Michelin-starred restaurants and some of the world’s top-rated bars, like Cafe La Trova or El Cielo.
The liquid is already breaking into some of America’s best and most-creative drinks markets, like Miami and New York, and its low-ABV quality and versatility, which Barrientos explains makes it “kind of like a gin.”
How To Drink Colombian Aguardiente
“There are a few ways of drinking aguardiente,” says Barrientos. “One is like a shot. The second way is on the rocks or with ice. This is my favorite one because the ice, [freezes] the liquor a little bit, but at the end it melts a little bit and makes it [smoother]. So it’s really nice and gentle in the mouth.”
The second option makes it more similar to how Tequila is enjoyed in Mexico with dinner. “[In Mexico] they have a shot [of tequila] on the rocks or a shot with a little bit of soda and while you are eating you are sipping small other drinks,” he explains. “With aguardiente it’s also good because it helps you digest during the dinner.”
Another option for Barrientos is cocktails, which has helped spread the drink from Colombian communities to these top restaurants and cocktail bars. “We have created more than six, seven signature cocktails for El Cielo with Bacan (aguardiente), and it’s been great and very fun for our chefs and the mixologists because also the chefs get involved in the mixology process. So we are all playing in the bar with the guaro and creating new drinks.”
Barrientos has gone as far as making aguardiente cocktail pairings for his menus, where each flavor of the dish is made to pair with the drink.
Colombian Aguardiente Cocktails
The recent introduction of high-quality guaro like Bacan to the market has made it easier to use in cocktails. It can be as simple as replacing the gin in a gin and tonic, or using it in more complex cocktails like sours or in place of ingredients like absinthe.
“In the 2010s, we had this obsession with absinthe and things like that where it is very kind of forward in that [anise] flavor,” explains spirits and cocktail writer, educator, and consultant Gabriel Urrutia. “I think Bacan has it subtly introduced into the liquid, so it’s not that overly licorice jellybean type of thing. It allows you to build a lot of beautiful drinks around it. For example, when we’re creating affinity pairings, I love it with blueberries. I love it with citrus. I love it with herbs. If you like Thai basil, which kind of has those notes in there, in like a basil smash, right? That just drinks so beautifully. It just really allows you to elevate and work with other flavors that you’re adding to a cocktail. For me, I love it in a sour. I’ve had it in a spritz as well. I’ve had it with passion fruit. It really allows you to just play with a lot because it’s really versatile in that respect.”
A particular favorite of Urrutia is a hand shaken daiquiri: “That distillate really lends itself to bringing out the real beauty in that cocktail,” he says. “I love lime, sugar, and Bacan shaken, served in a coupe glass. Absolutely beautiful. Subtle low ABV again, something that you can session out. It drinks super refreshing. It’s almost kind of like this beautiful guaro limeade.”
At El Cielo, Barrientos likes to use it with Colombian fruits, like “passion fruit, lulo, soursop, tangerine, different types of citrus,” he says. “We play a lot with fruits, Colombian fruits, and it blends perfectly.”
When To Drink Colombian Aguardiente
Urrutia likes to use guaro as a drink for celebrating occasions, something for when people get or work together. “Growing up in Miami, it’s a pretty strong shot occasion,” he explains. “It’s an occasion of hospitality. It’s an occasion of sharing, it’s a moment of celebration amongst Colombian people. You go to a house or a soccer game or they are coming to a party, you are most likely gonna see a bottle of aguardiente to enjoy. So that’s kind of the cool part of what the occasion of that is. It’s really just a moment of togetherness essentially for Colombians.”
“[Colombian aguardiente] is kind of for that celebratory occasion,” Urrutia suggests. “It could be drank room temperature, which [is how] I usually drink it, or it can be put in the freezer, or put in the cooler box. So all those things really allow it to be like, ‘Cool, we’re gonna drink this and it’s gonna be we’re having a barbecue outside. Let’s enjoy this and let’s cool off a little bit.’ So I think it’s something that people will turn to and say, ‘there’s an alternative here to the other liquors that are out there.’”
The Rise of Latin American Spirits & Spread Of Guaro
Over the last decade, Tequila and mezcal have both taken off in popularity. Skyrocketing sales and prices of both spirits can be seen from Sao Paulo to New York to Paris, Tokyo, and beyond. And it’s clear that Latin flavors are in demand in both the food and drinks worlds. In 2023, the world’s best restaurant, according to the World’s 50 Best Restaurants list, cooked and concocted in Lima, Peru. Even the world’s top bars are currently found in Latin America with Mexico City’s Handshake Speakeasy recently earning the title of the World’s Best Bar in 2024, according to 50 Best Bars.
It’s not just bars and restaurants in that part of the world either. Those ingredients and products help put places like London’s Viajante87 (currently ranked 99th) or Athens’ Baba Au Rum (currently ranked 17th)–known for rum, mezcal, and tequila cocktails–become well-known names across the globe.
“I truly think that there is a global appeal for this type of Latin culture,” Urrutia points out. “We see it everywhere, right? We just saw 50 best bars. It was in Madrid. We saw a whole bunch of Latin American bars activating, and not only that, but we saw a lot of Latin American bars and, in that case, a North American bar actually won 50 best bars. Handshake [Speakeasy] from Mexico City won the top bar in the world. So there’s an appeal for these types of spirits. There’s an appeal for the exploratory aspect for what the Americas brings to the table from a spirit standpoint.”
“I think Colombia is pretty trendy right now,” remarks Barrientos. “People are going to Colombia and have been going for the last 15 to 20 years [making it into] a tourist destination. When you go to Colombia, you have fun, you drink aguardiente, so now you start spreading the word. So now you start finding good aguardientes and people start talking, ‘oh, there’s good aguardientes,’ like high-end. So I think we are in a great time for aguardiente.”
“Colombia, it’s a country that celebrates everything. Everything that we can make a party of, we’ll make a party,” he adds. ”For us, everything is a party. So I think we, being a very festive culture, and aguardiente being our mainstream alcohol for celebrating, makes our aguardiente so important for Colombian culture.”
Whatever it is, Colombian aguardiente is on the rise and has entered the battlefield of ‘what will be the next hot spirit’ ready to take the throne.
