Mexico’s coffee is a reflection of its land. Each growing region — Chiapas, Oaxaca, Veracruz, and beyond — brings its own character to the cup. High-altitude mountains, rich volcanic soil, and distinct climates create flavors that range from bright and floral to deep and chocolatey. The myriad types of Mexican coffee offer equally diverse flavors for connoisseurs to enjoy in every cup.
These coffees aren’t just beverages; they’re expressions of place, shaped by the people who grow and brew them. Here’s a look at some of the most iconic coffee traditions rooted in Mexico’s diverse regions.
1. Café de Olla (Nationwide)
Description: Café de Olla isn’t just coffee; it’s a potion of patience and practicality. Brewed in clay pots with piloncillo, unrefined cane sugar that smells like the holidays, and cinnamon that bites as gently as time.
Why It’s Popular: This isn’t a coffee for rushing. It forces you to slow down, to taste every note of the soil and sun where it grew. It’s the liquid equivalent of sitting on your grandmother’s porch, letting the world spin itself apart while you cling to the warmth of familiarity.
2. Lechero (Veracruz)
Description: The Lechero is theater masquerading as a drink. It starts with a modest splash of strong coffee in your glass. Then comes the milk, poured from a height that seems both absurd and elegant. The milk crashes into the coffee, creating the perfect foam.
Why It’s Popular: This one is my personal favorite. The ritual is half the charm. You don’t just drink a Lechero; you witness it, participate in it. It’s Veracruz in a cup — loud, dramatic, and impossibly smooth once you let it settle.
3. Café Pluma (Oaxaca)
Description: Café Pluma is grown at altitude. The beans come from the Sierra Sur region of Oaxaca, where clouds hover low and the coffee grows high. The resulting brew is smooth, nutty, and just acidic enough to remind you it’s alive.
Why It’s Popular: This is coffee for purists. No piloncillo, no milk, no distractions — just the unadulterated essence of what coffee is meant to be. It’s the taste of Oaxaca, complex and grounding, like the mountains it calls home.
4. Café Chiapaneco (Chiapas)
Description: Café Chiapaneco is like drinking sunlight filtered through leaves. Its beans, grown in the highlands of Chiapas, carry notes of fruit and flowers, a kind of sweetness that feels accidental yet deliberate.
Why It’s Popular: Chiapas is coffee royalty, and this brew proves why. It’s a favorite for those who believe coffee should taste like where it’s from, unapologetically and unmistakably. Every sip is a postcard from the mountains.
5. Café Turco (Puebla)
Description: Café Turco is bold and unapologetic, much like the Lebanese immigrants who brought it to Puebla. Brewed in tiny pots with ground beans so fine they’re almost dust, it’s rich, spiced, and as thick as a good story.
Why It’s Popular: This isn’t coffee for the faint of heart. It’s strong enough to wake the dead or, at the very least, keep you up through the stories that only come out after midnight. It’s Puebla’s tribute to its multicultural soul.
6. Café con Piloncillo (Central Mexico)
Description: Café con Piloncillo is coffee’s answer to a hug. It’s brewed with unrefined sugar that tastes like molasses and smoke and sometimes hints of citrus. A touch of vanilla or cinnamon might sneak in, but only to accentuate, never to overpower.
Why It’s Popular: It’s the perfect balance of bitter and sweet, a drink that feels less like a choice and more like an inevitability. This coffee is comfort, plain and simple, meant to be savored on mornings when the world feels just a little too sharp.
7. Café Tabasqueño (Tabasco)
Description: Café Tabasqueño marries coffee and chocolate in a way that feels inevitable, like they were always meant to be together. It uses cacao grown in the same region, turning the drink into a rich, velvety celebration of Tabasco’s finest exports.
Why It’s Popular: It’s the kind of drink that makes you wonder why you ever drank coffee without chocolate. The bitterness of the coffee meets the sweetness of the cacao, creating a harmony that’s impossible to ignore. It’s Tabasco in a cup: bold, sweet, and unmistakably rich.
8. Café Potosino (San Luis Potosí)
Description: Café Potosino adds a twist of orange zest, giving the drink a brightness that feels unexpected yet welcome. Sometimes a splash of brandy sneaks in, like a wink you weren’t sure you saw.
Why It’s Popular: This is coffee for evenings, for conversations that stretch longer than they should. It’s the perfect blend of bitter and citrus, a drink that feels like a secret you’re let in on every time you take a sip.
9. Café con Cajeta (Guanajuato)
Description: Café con Cajeta takes the rich, caramelized goat’s milk Guanajuato is famous for and stirs it into coffee. The result is a drink so creamy and indulgent it feels like dessert pretending to be breakfast.
Why It’s Popular: It’s impossible not to love. Sweet without being cloying, rich without being heavy — it’s the kind of coffee that feels like a treat but works as a bribe to get through the day.
10. Café de Chiapas con Nanche (Chiapas)
Description: This coffee infuses its brew with nanche, a small, tart fruit that tastes like a dare. The result is a drink that’s both familiar and entirely its own, balancing the richness of coffee with the tang of something wild.
Why It’s Popular: It’s not for everyone, and that’s part of the appeal. It’s coffee for adventurers, for people who don’t mind a little risk in their cup. It’s Chiapas at its boldest, daring you to take another sip.
Stephen Randall has lived in Mexico since 2018 by way of Kentucky, and before that, Germany. He’s an enthusiastic amateur chef who takes inspiration from many different cuisines, with favorites including Mexican and Mediterranean. His recipes can also be found on YouTube.
Source: Mexico News Daily
