Tequila's country cousin, mezcal, seems to be getting more attention these days south of the border. This would perhaps be unsurprising in Oaxaca, where much of the stuff is made, and agave or maguey, the plant from which it is made: grows not only in the wild ...
... and in botanical gardens ...
... but even in churchyards:
In Mexico City, too, mezcal seemed to be all over while tequila was laying low. We tasted quite a bit of it over the week, but I honestly can't give you any recommendations: much of the stuff seems to be made by local distilleries that don't have high profiles or international distribution.
I can tell you to look for "reposado" or "anejo" mezcals; these terms indicate that the stuff has been aged for various amounts of time, and therefore has mellowed. Don't buy one with a worm in it (that is a kitschy tourist thing), but do drink your mezcal straight, with orange slices dusted with gusano-worm salt. And if you find one labeled "pechuga," here's what that means: the mezcal was produced with a raw chicken breast suspended over it, which is supposed to subtly alter the taste. And so it did.
(Incidentally, mezcal is made by fermenting the sweet heart of the maguey plant -- after you've chopped off all those spiky leaves -- into a drink called pulque, which is then distilled into liquor. Pulque was considered a sacred drink among the pre-Hispanic peoples of the region, and is still available if you know where to look. It's basically a maguey cider, yeasty and a bit sour.)
The other drink that's all the rage in Mexico now is wine -- local wine. The best come from Baja California, where several wineries have found microclimates in the mountains that work well for grapes ranging from nebbiolo to sauvignon blanc and cabernet sauvignon. These wines are seldom imported into the United States, but if you can find an Ulloa cabernet/petite sirah blend, or a white wine called Silvana, I strongly recommend them.
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