Cantarito
Also known as Cantarito de tequila
Tequila, lime and grapefruit in a clay cup: Jalisco’s roadside highball, halfway between a Paloma and a Margarita.
The Cantarito is a Jalisco drink served in the small clay cup it is named for — an unglazed cantarito that keeps the drink cold and adds an earthy note to the rim. Tequila, lime, grapefruit and salt are the constants, usually with grapefruit soda doing the lengthening. Its origins are oral rather than printed: one account places it in Tapalpa, Jalisco, in 1933, others in the Mexican Revolution, and none of them can be verified. It became a tourist fixture in the 1970s and is now the standard alternative to the Paloma in western Mexico.
- Bars outside Mexico now serve it in the clay cup as a point of difference, and fresh grapefruit has replaced soda in the better versions.
- Cantarito with fresh grapefruit juice and soda
- Paloma (in a glass)
- Cantarito with mezcal
“The cup is part of the recipe: the porous clay holds the chill and the smell of wet earth sits in every sip.”
Ingredients
- Tequila60 ml
- Lime juice20 ml
- Grapefruit juice40 ml
- Grapefruit soda60 ml
- Salta pinch
- Grapefruit sliceto garnish
Method
Build in a clay cantarito over ice with the tequila, lime, grapefruit juice and a pinch of salt, top with grapefruit soda and garnish with a grapefruit slice.
Clay cantarito · ice · grapefruit slice