The coolest corner on Av. Revolución boasts a tacos a vapor stand from the iconic La Especial, the stylish Hotel Lafayette, and chef Javier Caro’s hotspot for dreamy cocktails in addition to burgers, pizza, and American gastropub fare transposed by Baja California ingredients. Think cochinita pibil sliders, grilled octopus burgers, and pork belly pizzas with cilantro pesto paired with complex drinks like the La Justina, a tequila-based drink with citrus, cinnamon, and dark beer. The cocktails alone can punctuate the end of an exciting day in Tijuana, especially if you’re staying upstairs at the Lafayette.

Conveniently located just off Av. Revolución around the corner from Caesar’s where it overlooks the delightful mayhem from a fifth floor penthouse is the taproom and brewery of one of Tijuana’s most respected brewers. Enjoy flights of Mexican IPA’s, saisons, ales, and blondes with campy names alongside pub burgers, nachos, and spicy wings. 

It’s hard not to get excited as the tableside cart arrives and you watch as an elegant waiter whisks up a garlicky, umami-rich dressing in a wide wooden bowl before gently tossing the mixture with fresh leaves of romaine. After all, this is where the Caesar salad was invented in the 1920s, and since then, Caesar’s zesty, simple recipe has gone on to grace menus globally. Opened in 1927, and restored in 2010 to its original decor and glory by the current owners, the Plasencia Group, the menu includes period classics like oysters Rockefeller, sole meuniere, and beef Wellington, plus local trends born in recent decades like tamarind martinis.

One of Tijuana’s most famous tacos is the Nueva York en trozo, or thin, elongated cuts of New York steak in a corn tortilla, which has been perfected by Pedro Mejia since he opened in the Otay neighborhood in 1989. Mejia’s Nueva York en trozo overhangs across the corn tortilla, layered with whole beans, guacamole, onions, cilantro, and salsa. Their adobada tacos are another must-have taco here, and not too far away in Otay Constituyentes is their sister restaurant operated by Culinary Art School grad and taquero Adrian Mejia, Pedro’s son. Besides their classics, you can order chile relleno tacos, giant plates of adobada nachos, and Flamin’ hot California burritos.

There’s stiff competition surrounding this lesser-known Altabrisa food truck, among the many taqueros vying for the best seafood tacos in Tijuana, and these ones are among the elite. Tacos de camarón enchilado (spicy shrimp) come oozing with plump shrimp, creamy sauces, and melted cheese, and the beer-battered fish and shrimp tacos are also solid. The smoked marlin tacos are a must, as well as the Poseidon, a formidable antojito consisting of a large toasted flour tortilla loaded with camarón enchilado and smoked marlin that requires two hands and your full attention.

The Valadez family opened Tacos La Glorieta in 1982, followed by Tacos El Frances (‘86), but they struck gold at Tacos El Franc (‘96), in downtown Tijuana where its massive red trompo of sweet, spiced adobada (pork in adobo) serves as the nucleus of the city’s food scene. The carne asada team makes solid mesquite-grilled steak tacos, alongside the stainless-steel comal cooking suadero (beef belly), chitterlings, and beef tongue are fried in their own fat. Orders from the taquero on the adobada station come fast, dressed with chopped onions, and cilantro, then coated with creamy guacamole, and a mild red salsa at Tijuana’s busiest taquería. 

Since 1996, Luis Mena, and Malú Leyva’s Sonoran-style caguamanta (stingray soup, previously made with turtle) restaurant has warmed bellies with its fragrant stews full of stingray, shrimp, and tuna fin in a tomato and dried red chile base brimming with chopped vegetables. The seafood tacos are exceptional: smoked marlin, tuna fin, Tijuana-style octopus with green olives, and the 3 animales, a mix of smoked marlin, stingray, and moronga (Sonoran blood pudding), chased with a cup of bichi, or the caguamanta stock, dressed with shredded cabbage, and a squirt of lime.

Everyone here is greeted as paisa at the freshest seafood shack in the city, with a menu of fine shellfish, seafood cocktails, tostadas, and molcajetes full of the region’s best seafood in a spicy lime, and umami mixture. Start with prepared white clams or chocolatas, dressed with chopped vegetables, lime juices, and salsas, then enjoy a tostada especial stacked with callo de hacha, octopus, shrimp, and sea snail soaked in lime juice, canned tomato juice, and Worcestershire sauce. Follow all that up with a molcajete filled with raw shrimp, callo de hacha, and any other seafood you desire.

Chef and restaurateur Adria Marina, currently a judge on the Spanish language reality competition show Top Chef VIP, opened her elegant dining room in 2018. The international and contemporary menu offers shaved abalone with French fries, risotto of mushrooms and black truffles, time-honored steak frites, and a burger dripping with melted cheese and butter. The breakfast menu features eggs Benedict, Georgina’s riff on the Grand Slam with ricotta pancakes, and chilaquiles with burrata.

Tijuana’s infamous, and delicious, torteria was founded by Daniel Pérez in 1947. Luis Fitch, who befriended Pérez’s first wife, convinced her to sell the recipe, reviving Tijuana’s best steamed torta de lomo (tenderloin) after 30 long years. The original torta de lomo comes with mayo, avocado slices, and tomatoes, however, the especial, a dreamy upgrade which includes ham and cheese is the way to go for a taste of this time-honored recipe. 

Since this popular urban space opened in 2014, it has served as an incubator for young chefs who’ve gone on to open notable restaurants and a sunny haven for Tijuana food lovers. Its resident food trucks and carts include Azaroza for fancy French toast, Otto’s Grill which serves ceviches, seafood tostadas, and grilled fish, Baja seafood taco spot Ta’Costeño, and Lírica Cerveceria, a Mexican craft brewery.

Serving the Cacho neighborhood since 2010, Don Álvaro Rios and his family have established themselves as one of the city’s elite beef birria stands, with a deeply flavorful adobo that seasons each dripping bite of beef. Under a red canopy, taqueros plate beef birria tacos, and the specialty of the simple stainless steel cart is a taco filled with beef tongue birria and jiggly pieces of beef nerves that fall off the bones used to enrich the stock. Quesatacos (fried cheese and birria), and quesabirrias (melted cheese and birria) are some of the other ways to enjoy birria, and don’t forget to grab a cup of consomé.

While Tijuana’s regional torta may be the torta de lomo (tenderloin), the day Juan Manuel Hernández brought a bread roll to his taco stand to make himself a carne asada torta for lunch changed this border town forever. Arguably one of the best tortas in all of Mexico is simple —marinated steak cooked over mesquite that’s chopped and briefly placed in a steam pan then packed between a flour-dusted white pambazo roll spread with mayo and guacamole. The final touch, a pickled tomato and purple onion salad for a sandwich that’s an emblem of the city, which has outlasted the car wash that gave Tortas Washmobile its name. 

Chef Oswaldo Flores Lagunas’s industrial space brightened by geometric tiles, white columns, and light wood paneling is all things to all people. There’s inventive contemporary Mexican cuisine like baby vegetable crudité with sikil pak dip, tostadas of fish ceviche in tropical coconut and mint, grilled cauliflower with mole encacahuatado (peanut mole), and so much more. The modern cocktail program is tops in Tijuana, and their international and national wine selection of both natural and classic wines is world-class. Go on a Wine Koolture Wednesdays, where all bottles consumed at the restaurant or purchased to go are standard retail price.

Since 1990, the scent of toasted cinnamon wafting in the dining room from pots of cafe de olla, warm corn tortillas on a comal, and fresh-cut papaya have welcomed Tijuanenses into a charming restaurant that evokes classic Mexico. Fried cubes of herbed potatoes and refried beans come with everything, from the machaca ranchera, or beef jerky sauteed with tomatoes, onions, and peppers, to tangy huevos rancheros, the house omelet bathed in a chipotle cream sauce, an a variety of chilaquiles. After three decades, this Gastronomic Zone institution continues to offer quintessential Tijuana breakfast.

Founded in Rosarito in 2001 before relocating to Tijuana’s “Gastronomic Zone”, restless hunter, fisherman, and countryside chef Miguel Ângel Guerrero’s flagship restaurant remains a part of Tijuana’s culinary evolution. Guerrero’s “Baja Med” hits like chocolata clam shots, soy sauce soaked carpaccio of thinly-sliced pen shell clam, mesquite grilled tacos filled with spicy abalone chorizo, and clay oven roasted “primal” lamb, paired with Mexican wine, illustrate the Mediterranean, Asian, and local flavors that have inspired Tijuana’s thriving restaurant scene.

One of the many Culinary Art School grads on this list, chef Ruffo Ibarra opened his restaurant in 2015 after working under top chefs in Europe and the U.S. Ibarra’s mesquite grill is at the center of a Baja California menu of well-smoked prime rib, USDA prime rib-eye, and largemouth bass, which comes with fried kale and salsa verde as well as inspired raw bar items such as a yellowtail tiradito with citrus and crispy seaweed and a blackened tuna tostada with cuttlefish ink and smoked watermelon.

Under a sea-blue awning in the 20 de Noviembre neighborhood is where one of Tijuana’s many taqueria institutions has been serving an array of seafood tacos since 2005. Camarón enchilado (spicy shrimp), pulpo olivo (octopus and olives), gobernador (shrimp and melted cheese), and smoked marlin are among the local seafood tacos that this taquería does very well. Mixed into the more than a dozen tacos on the menu are some of their own innovations, like their jamón del mar, or “ham of the sea”, a light jab at Starkist tuna, where large chunks of smoked marlin are fashioned like all tacos here, with long ribbons of purple onion, wavy strips of cabbage, a squirt of Mexican cream, and salsa.   

Inspired by the seafood carts and seafood taquerias of Tijuana, chef Javier Plascencia’s “cocina de mariscos”, opened in 2009 to bring a transcendent Mexican raw bar and hot bar using fresh, high-quality seafood from local waters to La Recta. A nice selection of Baja California oysters, pismo clams, and chocolatas, plus either red, black, or classic green aguachiles are well paired with Mexican wine or Mexican craft beer. Beer battered fish tacos, and camarón enchilado tacos highlight the flavors of the street, however, the tasty fish birria taco is tops, a celebration of all that is great about Tijuana on a tortilla. 

In 2020, chef Juan Cabrera of CDMX’s Fonda Fina converted a home into a restaurant in Lomas Hipódromo to create a space for the accomplished chef, who previously cooked at El Cardenal (CDMX), Le Cirque (CDMX), and Tierra Mia (Guadalajara), to explore and create. Soft pork jowl carnitas with “Mexican” kimchi and mini tlacoyos topped with grilled octopus and a smoky chintextle mayo reflect national dishes with a local touch and show Mexico’s deep appreciation for fermented foods from around the world.