A Michelada is a delicious twist on a light, refreshing, frosty mug of beer. It’s a great, refreshing Mexican cocktail that combines light and crisp Mexican beer with bold, mouthwatering ingredients like hot sauce, Worcestershire sauce, spiced salt, and freshly squeezed lime juice.
Michelada
This Mexican cocktail is so nice, refreshing, and also bold in flavor, that every sip is satisfying in every way. Whether you’re enjoying your relaxing weekend or following an intense football game, this is a perfect drink to have in hand.
A Michelada can be made in various ways. However, through some experimenting over the years, I believe this version to be the best one! This Michelada recipe is simple with its ingredients and the focus is completely on complimenting the crisp beer, rather than overwhelming it with other flavor.
This recipe enhances your favorite Mexican beer with flavors of citrus, spices, hot sauce, and Worcestershire sauce. All of those potent ingredients mix together with the beer to create an overall flavor that is complex, as it’s both refreshing and savory.
What Is Michelada?
Michelada is a Mexican beer cocktail. Essentially, it’s a flavorful twist on a light and refreshing beer. It includes a combination of light, crisp beer with flavorful ingredients like hot sauce, Worcestershire sauce, lime juice, and spices. The exact origin of this cocktail is not known, and many claim to have created it!
The exact recipe is also highly regional, and there is some debate about the addition or tomato/clamato juice. Many regions in the United States, as well as regions in Mexico, do prefer this cocktail with tomato juice. There are many who disagree and believe tomato juice does not go in the drink.
The main aspects of a Michelada is a light and crisp Mexican beer, the signature spicy salt rim, fresh lime juice, and additions of flavor enhancing ingredients like hot sauce, Worcestershire sauce, soy sauce, or Maggi sauce. Everyone who likes Micheladas is always looking for a great version of this recipe, and this one is proudly ours!
I like to keep the beer flavor the main and most prominent flavor. I personally find that adding tomato juice completely strangles the refreshing taste of beer, so we do not like it in our Micheladas. The main idea here is to flavor the beer with spicy, citrus, and salty notes, but keep it deliciously light and refreshing!
How to Make a Michelada
Ingredients You Need:
The Cocktail:
- Lime Juice – Freshly squeezed only! Do NOT use bottled lime juice for this recipe.
- Hot Sauce – I prefer Cholula hot sauce, but you can use whatever your preferred hot sauce is.
- Worcestershire Sauce – This tangy, powerful ingredient adds a nice savory flavor to the drink that can’t be replicated with anything else.
- Mexican Beer – Use a light Mexican beer of your choice.
- Seasoning – Just a few pinches of celery salt and freshly cracked black pepper add a little extra flavor that go a long way!
The Signature Rim:
- Tajin seasoning
OR
- Salt – Use coarse sea or kosher salt.
- Chili Powder – Chipotle chili powder is best, but regular chili powder is also a good choice.
- Paprika – Just a little pinch adds to the vibrant red color and mouthwatering flavor!
- Lime Wedges – This is what you’ll use as the “glue” for the spices to stick to the glass.
Directions:
Rim your glass(es).
Combine the salt, chili powder, and paprika together. (Or, add Tajin seasoning into a shallow dish.)
Rub the rim of each glass with a lime wedge, then dip the rim into the seasoning. Feel free to coat it pretty liberally – it’s really delicious!
Make the cocktail.
Add some ice to a pint glass carefully, as to not knock off any of the seasoning.
Add a pinch of celery salt and pepper, hot sauce, lime juice, and Worcestershire sauce to the glass.
Pour in the beer, and enjoy!
Frequently Asked Questions:
What Beer to Use in a Michelada Recipe?
Choose a light and crisp Mexican beer like Pacifico, Sol, Modelo Especial, or Corona. Although the classic beer to use in this recipe is a light beer, you can try it with a lager as well, like Tecate or Dos Equis, if preferred.
Is a Michelada spicy?
This is not a spicy recipe, in my opinion! The hot sauce adds a very light note of spice, but it’s complimentary to the other flavors. With that being said, you can make this drink more or less spicy if you’d like by increasing or decreasing the amount of hot sauce you add. Additionally, a pinch of cayenne pepper powder to the rim or into the cocktail is always a great way to heat things up.
Michelada Recipe
Michelada
Ingredients
- 3/4-1 oz fresh lime juice
- 1 1/2-2 tsp cholula hot sauce or another hot sauce
- 1 tsp Worcestershire sauce
- 12 oz light Mexican beer*
- pinch celery salt
- pinch black pepper
Rim:
- coarse salt
- chipotle chili powder
- paprika
- lime wedges
Instructions
Spicy Salt Rim:
- You'll notice that there are no measurements for ingredients for the salt rim and that is because it depends on how many cocktails you will be making. You can make enough salt for just a couple of cocktails, or you can make enough to many.
- General proportion for a spicy salt mix that I use is about 1 tablespoon of salt to 1 tablespoon of chili powder and about a teaspoon of paprika. If you want to keep it easy, you can use Tajin seasoning for cocktails. It's fast and convenient.
- To make the salt rim, combine salt, chili powder, and paprika together and mix well. Rub the rim of the glass with a lime wedge all around the rim and then dip the rim into the seasoning to liberally coat the rim with seasoning.
Cocktail:
- Carefully add some ice into a pint glass (so you don't knock off the seasoning) and add hot sauce, lime juice, and Worcestershire sauce.
- Add half the beer into the glass and give it a gentle stir to combine.
- Pour in the rest of the beer letting it mix naturally and enjoy.
Notes
Nutrition
Matt says
This is very good