A Guide to the Timeless Mexican Beer Cocktail

Cold beer and spicy tomato drinks--this concoction resolves hangovers.


The concept of a Chelada-a cold drink made better by the addition of strange things-has been with us for a long time in Mexico.


Cheladas can be simple or classy, with all sorts of fun components, but they must contain beer, lime, and salt. Probably the most well-known is the Michelada, aptly dubbed Mexican Bloody Mary. It usually comes with either tomato or clam juice, hot sauce, and things like Worcestershire sauce.


Sometime, beginning in the early days, Mexican beer-drinkers acquired the habit of first cleaning the rusty cap with lime, and then possibly dropping that very lime in the beer. It has almost become a custom now.


Micheladas started with one beer in particular when troops called for beer with lime and hot sauce. The owner then used "Michel" and called it "chelada".


"It's probably done today rather than back then," Brooks says. "Back then, cold was rare. I doubt they would have been getting cold beer mugs with salt on them."