Drinking agave-born elixirs is key to a trip to Mexico, but the salt-shot-lime routine (and head-pounding regret) are kid's stuff.
3. Cynthia Rowley, the fashion designer whose Airstream cum guest house appears on the previous pages, whips up something she calls the Wet Suit for visitors who really need to chill: put 3 shots light rum, 2 shots Cointreau, 1 1/2 shots fresh lime juice and 1 slice lime (or orange) into a shaker with ice.
Here, as a palate cleanser, they serve a cold shot of lime and green tea with, on the top, a hot foam of gin.
Piled into a sundae dish, the shrimp and scallops ceviche had a tomato sauce base, pepper-sparked, Guerrero-style, with a generous shot of lime juice and three thin crescents of fresh avocado on the rim of the glass.
Done in just 20 minutes, it's basically just steamed vegetables stir-fried with mustard and cumin seeds, fresh ginger and chopped serrano and then freshened with a last-minute shot of lime juice and cilantro.
I'll always ask if they happen to have the fried shrimp cakes — sometimes I get lucky — and often supplement the noodles with grilled Isaan sausage or an order of nam sod, a ground-pork salad spiked with slithery bits of pig's ear and a generous shot of lime.
Pair the sangrita and tequila with a shot of lime juice for "The Mexican Flag.
With a tequila shot and lime wedge in hand, lick the salt on your hand and shoot the tequila.
As tequila producers in Mexico wait for the supply of agave to rebound -- the plant takes eight years to mature -- they are cutting back on their least profitable products, the cheap, generic tequilas used primarily for slushy frozen margaritas, sugary house cocktails or for downing shots with lime and salt.
At one point, Mr. Terry raided Ms. Argiro's private stash of tequila and entreated Mr. Villani to mix shots with fresh lime juice for him.
(1) He brought an ice-luge to dinner and made you do several soco and lime shots while rythmically chanting "chug chug chug" over and over again.
