Mezcal Mainline: Santo Mezcal offers up regional Mexican food with flair
Santa Barbarans love their Mexican history and heritage. Not surprisingly, they also love Mexican food, and there is a lot of it here — uptown, downtown and everywhere in between.
A few years ago, the Luna family, who own three hugely popular Los Agaves restaurants in the Santa Barbara area, went a bit upscale when they opened Santo Mezcal a block from the beach in the now-very-hot Funk Zone–adjacent section of lower State Street. Hipper and a bit more dressed up than its siblings (but still decidedly SoCal casual), Santo Mezcal reflects its “family” heritage in a menu of delicious, carefully prepared authentic regional dishes, along with a casual, friendly vibe and the customer-centric service the Lunas are known for. These folks care, and they know how to do things right.
So, on a night when you’re ready to take your Mexcian culinary indulgence up a couple of notches, Santo Mezcal awaits. You’ll know it when you find it, because it always sounds like a party you want to attend, as friends and families chatter happily and share tastes of as many dishes as possible.
There’s a best way to “use” a given restaurant. The secret at Santo Mezcal is to start with one of their handcrafted mezcal-based cocktails. If you’re waiting for a table, grab a stool at the bar and take in the grand multi-tier spread of mezcals along the back wall. Mixed with other spirits, flowers, nuts, seeds, and fruit- and vegetable infusions, these cocktails do a delightful devil’s sweet, sour, salt, spicy — and because mezcal is involved — smoky dance on your tongue. You might try La Flor Ahumada (the smoking flower) — mezcal with honey-lavender syrup, lemon and a lavender bud; or the Peruvian, made with Fresno-chile and cilantro pisco, grapefruit, ginger cordial, lime, a Fresno chilie wheel and spicy salted Inca nuts.
You can figure out your next move while enjoying complimentary tortilla chips and a trio of homemade salsas.You might try the Camarones al Mezcal, Mexican shrimp in a creamy mezcal sauce; or the Pulpo a Las Basas, octopus in an adobo sauce with house-infused chile oil. Ceviches are a specialty, and for meat lovers, the Filete Antiguo is a rib-eye steak served with a cheese-stuffed pepper, an enchilada, nopal and more. The chile rellenos, the moles, the Cazuela Pibil (pork marinated in adobo sauce and slow-cooked in banana leaves) — it’s all delicious, so whatever you choose, get ready to love what you get.
