The bar that pulled the conversation south
José Luis León opened Licorería Limantour on Calle Álvaro Obregón in Roma Norte in 2011, just as the Mexican cocktail conversation was shifting from imported European spirits to what could be done with mezcal, sotol, raicilla, and the country's quietly enormous botanical pantry. The bar's argument, then and now, is that the cocktail tradition of the Americas - American, Mexican, Caribbean - is a single continuous conversation that the global cocktail-bar circuit had treated as three separate ones. Limantour spent fifteen years making that argument with cocktails, won several rounds of the World's 50 Best, and is now a permanent fixture of any honest Mexico City drinks list.
The room itself is small, busy, and unfussy - long marble bar, mid-century brass fittings, a soundtrack that rotates from Latin jazz to early-90s hip-hop, a kitchen at the back that puts out genuinely good bar food. The crowd is a mix of Roma Norte regulars, visiting bartenders, and tourists who arrived on a recommendation. Reservations get harder every year. Walk-ins still happen, particularly midweek before 8pm.
The drink to order is the Margarita al Pastor - tequila, pineapple, coriander, serrano, a small lime - which the bar built around the carnitas-taco flavour profile of the al pastor tradition and which has now been on the menu for more than a decade. Order it first. After that, ask the bartender what they are pulling out of the back; Limantour rotates rare bottles in and out of the well as they find producers worth supporting, and the off-menu mezcal pours are routinely the high point of the evening.
Before you go
Roma Norte is twenty minutes by Uber from Polanco, ten from Condesa, thirty from the airport. Limantour is on a corner; the entrance is unmarked but the bar is visible through the front window. Cards accepted. Tip 10% on the total. Closed Mondays. The kitchen runs until 1am - eat properly if you are settling in.