Mercado Tacuba

The Mercado Tacuba is one of Mexico City’s great public markets, and in a deeply historical and important neighborhood. The market is today the essential commercial, and in some sense, social center of the historic town, and today’s neighborhood.

The market opened in 1956 after a much much older market was torn down and replaced by the police station and court house. Those are across the street now. But as much of the church’s original atrium was lobbed off by the construction of the elevated Av. Marina Nacional in front, the market has taken up much of the rear of the church.

Just outside Metro Tacuba, the market is an essential end to the famous Mexico-Tacuba causeway. It’s the centerpiece of a giant, rather sprawling tianguis-style street market. One might even think that this same tianguis extends, with some interruptions, along most of the causeway.

A 2017 UAM study counted some 1,212 independent merchants here. That makes it easily the biggest of the 18 public markets in Miguel Hidalgo. Those numbers will vary by season and by what’s going on in the overall economy. Suffice it to say, there are always people cooking here. And the food is guaranteed to be better than what you will get in chain restaurants, or even in “restaurants.”