Tequila in Little Village (La Villita)

La Villita is the center of gravity for agave in Chicago. It is one of the largest and most established Mexican-American commercial corridors in the Midwest, and 26th Street is a working neighborhood main street — bakeries, butchers, quinceañera shops, restaurants and a liquor store that serious tequila drinkers across the city treat as a destination.

If you only shop for tequila downtown, you are getting the national brands plus whatever the distributor pushed. Little Village is where the selection gets interesting and the conversation gets specific.

Little Village's tequila culture is an extension of the community that built it, not a theme applied to it. Shop and drink here accordingly: ask questions, buy from the people who know the bottles, and tip well.