Finding Mexican Craft in the Riviera Maya

The first time I visited Playa del Carmen in Quintana Roo, Mexico, otherwise known as the Riviera Maya, was in 2012. I had travelled to the region numerous times previously, marrying Maggie on a beach outside of Puerto Morales in 2008 and writing a feature on its high-end resorts for The Globe and Mail a year later, among other visits, but for one reason or another I had never made it into the city.

Then came the World Atlas of Beer and the subsequent Pocket Beer Book, both of which I co-authored with Tim Webb, the former published for the first time in 2012 and the latter two years later. As the half of the team responsible for the Americas, I needed to suss out what was happening in the newly emerging Mexican craft brewing scene, preferably without having to travel from one end of the country to the other.

For the first edition of the Atlas – there have been three, the most recent published in 2021 – I was able to piece together a small handful of tasting notes, including one on the still quite lovely Tempus Doble Malta, and use reports from various Mexican beer correspondents to fill in the gaps. For the Pocket Beer Book, however, I needed tasting notes, a lot of tasting notes, and so had to figure out a place or places where I could try as many Mexican craft beers as possible in as short a time as possible.

Luckily, around that same time I received a press release touting the accreditation of the first Certified Cicerone in Mexico, one Luis Garces, who worked at the Fairmont Mayakoba not far outside of Playa del Carmen. Following a series of phone calls and emails, Luis and I began to hastily assemble a selection of beers from the early craft breweries of Mexico, and I arranged to visit him at the Fairmont to sample our way through the already impressive variety available.

Three days later, dozens of beers tasted and assessed, Luis generously offered to take me and Maggie into the city for dinner, after which he promised us a visit to a pioneering Playa beer bar. Now, if you’ve been to Playa, you will be familiar with the stretch of pedestrian mall universally known as ‘The Fifth,’ but back in 2012 it was considerable shorter and far less flashy than it is today, spanning mere blocks rather than its current and rather astonishing five miles. So shortly after we left the restaurant heading north, we exited the bright lights and tourist traps of The Fifth and strolled several dim and mostly uncommercialized blocks to find the recently opened bar.

That bar was Club de la Cerveza, and it is today not just a lynchpin of the dynamic area which now surrounds it, but also widely acknowledged as one of the finest drinking establishments in Playa.

Owned and operated by expat Argentinean Miguel Antoniucci, Club de la Cerveza started impressively and has notably improved on every subsequent visit. Open to the night air, with more tables outside than in, it’s a rustic, comfortable bar that would charm even if it offered only a handful of halfway decent beers, much less the more than respectable selection of local, national and international brews Antoniucci goes to great lengths to stock. Add in a small list of impressive Mexican wines and a range of domestic and international spirits, plus smiling, bilingual staff and a newly opened kitchen, and you have an equation that makes Club de la Cerveza a required stop for anyone visiting the area, beer aficionado or not.

What’s more, in addition to setting up a beer distributorship several years back, helping to greatly expand the reach of Mexican craft brewers in the Yucatan, Antoniucci has also opened Colectivo Mexicano Cervecero, or CMC, just a couple of blocks away from Club. Larger, with a more conventional ‘modern beer bar’ atmosphere, CMC, as its name suggests, places greater emphasis upon Mexican craft beer, rather than the more mixed bag available at Club, and features eight draught taps, as opposed to the quartet available at Club. Like its predecessor, CMC also features ample and hospitable outdoor space and a menu that highlights Mexican staples such as tacos and quesadillas, as well as burgers and sandwiches.

Not quite a ‘yin’ to Club’s ‘yang,’ it is a wonderfully complementary establishment that makes a visit to the top end of The Fifth well worth the climb!  

Club de la Cerveza, 5ta Avenida casi esquina 38 norte, Edificio MIMOSA, Local 7 C, Lote 5, Colonia Xaman-Ha, Playa del Carmen, Mexico

Colectivo Mexicano Cerveceros, 5ta avenida entre calle 40 y 42, Playa del Carmen, Mexico