There are few bars in the city where the menu tells you something about a specific festival in a Mexican state. At Tula Cantina, it’s different. The cocktail menu is inspired by the Guelaguetza, an annual festival in Oaxaca celebrating music, dance, and food. Each drink pays homage to that tradition, featuring ingredients like hoja santa, tejate, piloncillo, and fermented corn—not as decorative touches, but as the foundation of the recipes.
Behind Tula is Mirthe van der Schoot, who also founded Coba Taqueria, which opened seven years earlier in the same neighborhood. Tula is right next door. Silvia Philion, founder of Mezcaloteca and Mezcalosfera in Mexico, is involved as a guest, which lends the mezcal menu serious depth. It features more than fifty different mezcals and agave liqueurs. This isn’t a selection meant to impress with big names, but a menu that showcases just how broad the spectrum of agave spirits actually is.
The space is small and candlelit. You need to make a reservation in advance, because this isn’t the kind of place where you can just walk in on a whim and find a seat. That fits the concept: Tula isn’t a run-of-the-mill bar with a bottle of mezcal sitting on a shelf somewhere. It’s a bar that takes itself seriously. The house-made products illustrate this: Tula Vermouth Blanco, Tula Dry Vermouth, Tula Chile Pasilla Liqueur, Tula Cacao Liqueur, Tula Chocolate Bitters, Tula Cinnamon Bitters, Tula Tonic, and Tula Coffee Liqueur are all made in-house and used in the cocktails.
Each drink pays homage to the Guelaguetza tradition, with ingredients such as hoja santa, tejate, piloncillo, and fermented corn forming the basis of the recipes.
Tula Cantina is located in Noord, next to Coba Taqueria, and together with that taqueria, they form a small cluster of restaurants that clearly knows what it’s doing. The mezcal menu is a serious exploration of a spirit that is far from being fully explored in the Netherlands. Anyone who thinks mezcal is just smoke will change their mind here.
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