My Mentor: Tomas Estes
By Rebekkah Dooley
The first thing Tomas taught me was to ask questions. As a cripplingly shy youngster I was loath to raise my hand, interject, or say anything much at all in front of an audience larger than three. When I first met Tom I was too shy to hold staff briefings, and so I would brief my Bar Manager, who would in turn brief the staff. And so Tom taught me to speak more. I bought a book, ‘Tequila - A Complete Guide', and I swallowed it whole. I would report back to Tom with my new found knowledge, about pulque and Mayahuel and agave pups, and my enthusiasm was met like-for-like. I would bring him a fact, new to me, and he would give me ten more. I felt encyclopedic when in reality I was just scratching the surface but it felt good, really good. In trainings I started taking notes, writing down topics to research and eventually; I started asking questions.
We would meet at Cafe Pacifico and eat fajitas and churros at the quietest table which was by no means quiet but he requested it none the less. I exclusively drank beer and Tequila for five years of my life. Pacifico Clara was my favorite, it still is, and I liked knowing that the beer had let the restaurant use their logo free of charge. I would pick Tom’s brain and he would ask me questions that I hadn’t been asked before like "what do you want to do with your life?”
In that time I learnt that Tom was a really cool kid. He drove a Triumph with no shoes or shirt and would frequently ride from his native California over the border to Mexico where he was of legal drinking age. He knew a chain smoking monkey called Devil and he was both a wrestler and a teacher before he turned his hand to Tequila. While Cafe Pacifico was still a building site Hunter S. Thompson used it to stage an interview with the New York Times, requesting to be paid in mezcal and cocaine. Queen, the Jackson Five and Tina Turner all ate there, and Debby Harry waited three hours for a table. Tom jammed with Dennis Wilson and John McVie and has the cassette tapes to prove it. He was, and still is, the epitome of cool.
Over the course of fourty years Tom has opened eighteen restaurants in six countries. He launched Ocho with Carlos Camarena in 2008, speaks four languages and is the Mexican Ambassador of Tequila to Europe. His debut book, The Tequila Ambassador, sold out its first release and now retails for ten times its face value. His achievements are dazzling.
When Gareth and I launched The London Sessions in 2014, Tom would arrive early to secure a front row seat, smiling encouragingly as I spoke to a room of sixty people. When we presented together for the first time I saw my typed notes next to his written ones and felt immensely proud.
Tom gave me and my brother a book, a 1968 edition of Nine Stories. He said we reminded him of JD Salinger characters. When I moved to New York I brought it with me, a piece of home that gave me peace of mind tucked in the seat pocket of my plane seat alongside my passport. In Oregon we ate cherries macerated in Ocho Reposado and a whole artichoke - my first, a big step for a picky eater. In Mexico we visited Don Javier with mangos and papayas and we drank Batangas - another first, stirred with a kitchen knife, as it should be. Everything as it should be. My mouth hurt from smiling, my belly ached from laughing and my eyes prickled with tears - so happy I cried. In New Orleans, every year for five years on more-or-less the same date we ate dinner in the damp dank heat and talked.
If Tom has ever asked you a question you’ll understand what I mean when I say that he asks the questions to which he knows you need an answer. It’s a special kind of person who so patiently serves to enlighten others above themselves. That’s Tom.
When Tom and I are in the same country we catch up over dinner. He always makes sure there is a vegetarian menu available and requests a quiet table because, he says, he wants to be able to hear me. When we say goodbye he invariably tells me that he is proud of me and I thank him, trying to hide the crack in my voice. Recently Tom asked me what I wanted as a child, and my eyes grew shiny as I looked at the table and deflected the question with something non-committal because I wasn’t ready to tell him the answer. “To make someone proud.”