The Best Breakfast Restaurants in Guadalajara, Mexico
Finding great breakfasts in Guadalajara is not that hard. The city has a great mix of classic Mexican fare as well as some excellent international options.
Just be aware that actually getting a great breakfast can be chaotic. It is important to remember that Guadalajara is a huge metropolitan area and many of the best breakfast restaurants are small businesses with limited capacity. It isn’t as bad as Mexico City but if you get up late on the weekend you will find yourself waiting for hours at the hottest restaurants. Try to get an early start or send someone to put your name on the list and see what the wait is like. These restaurants are hot and serve some of the best breakfasts in Guadalajara.
Click here to read about the best restaurants in Guadalajara
I am always down to try a new restaurant so I’d love to hear about your favorite breakfasts in Guadalajara.
RinTinTin Café
Calle Morelos 1196, Colonia Americana, Guadalajara // Intragram
RinTinTin is a cult favorite that is kind of under the radar. The owner has one of the best social media presences in Guadalajara and I constantly run into publications of major celebrities like Gael Garcia Bernal and Alan Estrada (Alan X El Mundo) raving about the place.
Besides the design and marketing, the food is designed for foodies. Everything is delicious and there is a level of nostalgia in the homemade pop-tarts. The cinnamon rolls are some of the best in the city and the chilaquiles are one of my staples. Oh yeah, and there is seriously delicious coffee.
Mercado de Abastos
Calzada Lázaro Cárdenas and Avenida Manderina // Facebook
Birria, menudo, carne asadas; under one roof you have a concentration of small vendors that represent local ingredients and recipes. The decor may be a little rough around the edges but the food is exceptional and there is always something new to try.
palReal Café
Calle Lope de Vega 113, Arcos Vallarta, Guadalajara // Instagram
palReal is the pinnacle of the Guadalajara coffee experience but Chef Fabian Delgado has also built one of Guadalajara’s favorite kitchens. The partnership between roaster, barista, designer, and chef has turned a bunch of talented kids into local celebrities. What started out as a breakfast-only endeavor has grown into an exciting lunch and dinner affair.
Expect well-educated servers, carefully sourced ingredients, and baristas who compete in the national competitions; it is a well-balanced experience. There are a few things that you absolutely have to try. The lonche de pancita is arguably the best sandwich in town. The encacahuatadas breakfast dish is to die for, and tacos de vacio are EXCELLENT! Make sure to go a couple of times and buy a couple of bags of coffee to take home.
Los Yuntaites
Calle Garibaldi 824, Mercado Centenario, Zona Centro // Instagram Tag
Chef Fabian Delgado of palReal fame opened Los Yunaites in the Centenario Market just blocks from where he grew up. His business partner, a close personal friend, is from the town of San José de Gracia on the far side of Lake Chapala right where the State of Michoacan begins. The area is famous for cheeses and migrant farmworkers who would seasonally travel to the United States. They are affectionately called Los Yunaites.
The name of the restaurant roughly translates to concoctions from the villages. They are looking for unique and gourmet experiences.
Eating at Los Yunaites is like taking a trip to the pueblos without leaving the city. There are country-style, artisanal ingredients, and recipes that people in the city don’t see very often. The cumin-flavored mole is a family recipe from Tequila, Jalisco. The tortillas come from a Mazahua community that grows heirloom varietals. The encotijada with huitlacoche is like an enchilada but with a salty and creamy Cotija cheese sauce rather than a chile sauce. It is typical of the pueblos around, you guessed it, Cotija, Michoacán, the place that’s famous for cheese.
Los Yuntaites is an absolutely quintessential Mexican culinary experience that you have to check out while in the area.
Boulangerie Central
Calle Morelos 1984, Ladrón de Guevara, Guadalajara // Instagram
As the name would suggest, Boulangerie Central is a French-style bistro with excellent wheat flour bread and french sauces. The French toast is exceptional, there are a couple of exciting hollandaise dishes and your staple Mexican breakfasts. Make sure to come early on the weekends because this place is busy.
Menudo Restaurants In Guadalajara
Menudo is a dish that I did not eat often in the United States because I didn’t know where to buy it. A friend would make homemade menudo for special occasions like birthdays and baptisms but every time I would order it in a restaurant I was left feeling unsatisfied. Now that I have been living in Mexico for a significant period of time, I know the difference between a spectacular bowl of menudo and an average one.
The dish may be difficult for many people to try because of preconceived notions about ingredients they have never tasted. It is made with the intestinal tract of the animal and the texture is soft. I think that one of the defining characteristics of Mexican food is the ability to take what many ‘developed countries’ consider to be less than desirable ingredients and make something absolutely delicious.
If you are a little hesitant to eat intestine, try ordering just a broth and fixing it up with onion, chile, and lime. There is a good chance you will fall in love and order it again and again.
Menuderia Chela
Calle 2 4-202, Mercado de Abastos, Guadalajara // Instagram
The sign reads, “Traveler who came to Guadalajara and didn’t come to Chela, didn’t come to Guadalajara”.
This humble restaurant hidden inside Mercado de Abastos is iconic and has served some of Mexico’s most famous people.
It is decorated with pictures of the matriarch with presidents, musicians, and pillars of industry. And not just your average run-of-the-mill musicians. I’m talking about the one and only Don Vicente Fernandez. Not only is that man one of Mexico’s most treasured recording artists but he knows how to eat.
She is pictured with former president and middle-aged heartthrob Enrique Peña Nieto. Then there is Emilio Azcárraga, owner of Televisa and backer of one of San Diego’s favorite restaurant groups. These people, pillars of society, know good food and Doña Chela is the godmother of menudo in Guadalajara.
Also featured in:
Mercado de Abastos: Guadalajara´s Wholesale Market and Neighborhood
Menudería y Cenaduria La Estancia
Avenida Guadalupe 5085, Jardines del Tepeyac, Zapopan // Instagram
This is a newer restaurant that has really taken the neighborhood by storm. It is popular with both locals and visitors alike. Driving by on the weekend will show a team of valet parking attendants running to fetch cars.
The architecture is kind of funny because it is a mid-century mansion with a ten-story tower on either side. They are like the last holdout on the block that hasn’t built a tower. And even though the dining area has been remodeled with a modern style, looking into the kitchen reveals some original retro details. The family never left. They just converted the ground floor into a restaurant and moved upstairs.
I was really impressed with the menudo, the pozole, and the fried blue corn quesadillas. It was my first time having beef tongue in a menudo but it was a great complement to the tripe.
Menudería La Familia de Doña Jose
Avenida Xochitl 4593, Prados Tepeyac, Zapopan
Located across the street from the UNIVA university on the culinary corador that is Avenida Xotchitl, this place is packed on the weekends. They serve very affordable food including eggs, chilaquiles, and quesadillas. The fried quesadillas with squash blossoms are always a great way to start you day.
As much as I love the menudo here, I can’t finish a plate of eggs and a bowl of menudo. I usually order a plate of scrambled eggs with bacon with is served with a small order of chilaquiles and refried beans. However, I like to start with just a menudo broth that I prepare with chile, lime, and oregano.
Not always, but a big line out in front of a restaurant on a Sunday morning is a pretty good sign that the restaurant is worth a look. If you happen to be near the UNIVA than you should give Menuderia La Familia de Doña José a look.
Menudería y Carnes Asadas Alfonso
Avenida Mandarina L1, Comercial Abastos, Guadalajara
This is where I fell in love with menudo. When I moved to Mexico for grad school in 2009 I lived a few blocks away in the Jardines del Bosque neighborhood. I would come walking most days. The first couple of days I went shopping in the market I was intimidated by the long lines of people at Alfonso’s place. One day, Alfonso’s nephew who was working as the manager asked me if he could find me a place at the bar. Somebody just happened to be leaving and I got a seat in front of the tortilla lady. I think those tortillas and menudo changed my life.
There are still many of the original employees who have worked there since 2009. This is a special restaurant inside a special market. People who work in the food and beverage industry from all over the region come to Mercado de Abastos to eat at Menuderia and Carne Asadas Alfonso and so should you.
Birria Restaurants
Birria is typically a breakfast dish and most birrierías close early in the day. The birria in Mercado de Abastos is usually sold out by 1pm on a busy Saturday or Sunday.
Los Chilaquiles
Multiple Locations // Facebook
What I love about Los Chilaquiles is the emphasis that they put on ranch-style food. They buy most of their ingredients from local producers in the ranches surrounding Guadalajara. The family that owns and operates Los Chilaquiles comes from a small town called San Miguel de Cuyutlán and many of their recipes are from that part of Jalisco. Make sure to try the nata (milk fat), some gorditas, and an order of the birria. This birria is a mixture of beef and pork so it is a little different than most of the birria you will find in Guadalajara.
Plaza de las 9 Esquinas
Calle Galeana 379, Zona Centro, Guadalajara // Instagram
The Plaza de las Nueva Esquinas is not a restaurant but a plaza surrounded by a number of traditional restaurants and cantinas. The plaza is famous for excellent birria and pitayas (cactus fruit). Before there was a fountain in the plaza, there was a watering hole for mules and cantinas for mule drivers. This is where they would both come to drink before and after traveling.
Birrieria de las 9 Esquinas is probably the most photogenic of the restaurants with an art deco exterior and open kitchen with Talavera tiles on the inside.
Next to the Birrieria de la 9 Esquinas is the Pilon de los Arrieros Restaurant. The name is a reference to the history of the plaza. The food at the Pilón de los Arrieros is excellent and the atmosphere is beautifully decorated with local artwork that looks like it was taken from Tlaquepaque.
The Plaza de las 9 Esquinas is in Downtown Guadalajara and a marvelous place to start a walking tour of the historic core.
Birriería Chololo
Multiple Locations // Facebook
One of Guadalajara’s most treasured institutions. The original brick-and-mortar location is in Tlaquepaque and the Hacienda is just past the airport on the highway to Chapala. All goat meat, nothing modern. It is awesome to see those huge clay ovens still churning out my favorite local food. Here is a list of some other great birria restaurants.
Conclusion: Best Breakfast Restaurants In Guadalajara
One of the reasons that I started writing a blog was to look back and remember some great culinary experiences. Guadalajara is an exceptional place to try some exceptional food. Chances are that most travelers will be able to find something that is new and unique to them.
I hope you found something interesting on this list or maybe it just made you hungry 🙂 Buen provecho amigos.
