Norte Brewing Co. Rooftop

Norte Brewing Co. occupies a rooftop at the corner of Avenida Revolucion and Calle 6 in Tijuana's Zona Centro, looking down the length of the city's most famous street. Baja California is the centre of Mexican craft brewing, with the majority of the country's independent breweries concentrated in Tijuana, Mexicali and Ensenada, and Norte is among the easiest places for a visitor to understand that scene without leaving downtown. The brewery produces its own range on site, typically covering a pale ale, an IPA, a stout, a wheat beer and rotating seasonals, and pours guest taps from neighbouring Baja producers alongside them. The terrace is the draw. Open to the sky, furnished in wood and steel with heaters for cool evenings and a bar running along one side, it gives a view over the arches and neon of Revolucion that few other venues in the centre can match. The mood is relaxed and music-forward rather than raucous, and the crowd mixes Tijuana residents in their twenties and thirties with visitors who have walked up from the border crossing. Food is designed around the beer rather than as an afterthought. Beer-braised short rib is the plate most associated with the kitchen, served with the brewery's own stout in the braise; sausage boards, fried octopus, burgers, wings and sharing platters fill out a menu meant for groups. Most dishes fall between 150 and 350 pesos and pints run around 90 to 130 pesos, so an evening here is inexpensive by comparison with Zona Rio restaurants. No reservations are taken and none are usually needed, though the terrace fills on Friday and Saturday evenings after 8PM and at sunset in summer. Service runs Wednesday to Sunday from 2PM to midnight, and the venue is closed at the start of the week. Dress is casual.