Guia Cultural da Costa Verde

Paraty • Paraty

CACHAÇA MARIA IZABEL

The name is female, the quality pleases both genders

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It is unanimous to say that this is a special cachaça. The still is located by the seaside in the pleasant Sítio Santo Antônio, and the female personality who lends her name to the drink – Maria Izabel – are more than good reasons. She has personally preserved the home-made tradition for distilling cachaça since 1996, from the sugar-cane culture to bottling, maintaining a family custom that began with her great-great grandfather. He produced the liquor back in 1800 and even exported it to Portugal, as evidenced in correspondence proudly displayed at the distillery.

Izabel works almost single-handedly, with the assistance of four employees only. The sugarcane plantation lies on a slope, which naturally increases the sugar content. Other factors in favor are the brief period between harvesting and crushing the cane and the production flow, with everything very close by on the sloping terrain that makes use of gravity.

A detail that makes a difference is preserving the liquor for at least one year stored in wooden barrels before bottling: Gold in oak and Silver in jequitibá. In addition to these two, there is also an excellent Bluish variety with the use of tangerine leaves during the fermentation, as well as an aged “special reserve” that is served only at the distillery. The outcome is an extremely pure cachaça reputed as one of the best in the region, which displays the Inmetro and Geographic Indication seals. In the Playboy magazine quality rating, it has always been among the top ten in Brazil.

To value such a special product, the packaging also has to be special. Izabel was given the label design by her friend Liz Caldas – the Englishwoman who created the Flip literary festival – fashioned by famous illustrator and producer of the Flip posters, Jeff Fischer. It is beautiful!

A visit to the distillery requires scheduling, in particular to receive instructions on how to get to the property and be hosted by Izabel herself. In addition to being a producer of cachaça, she also loves living peacefully, preferably barefoot next to the sea and amidst the woods and fauna with the sounds of nature in her private paradise!

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