34 Best Restaurants in Side Trips from Mexico City, Mexico

This intimate spot has excellent food and hanging lamps and masks. You'll find a fairly typical selection of meat, poultry, and seafood dishes, including salmon with grilled onions and spicy chile de árbol sauce and steak with a savory mustard sauce, but the favorites are garlic-and-shrimp soup and the queso al cilantro, fried cheese on a bed of potato skins, covered with salsa verde.

This cavelike restaurant might only be open on Friday and Saturday, but it has unforgettable regional cuisine and a fun atmosphere with live music. Even simple items like the salsas and frijoles (black beans) are intensely flavored. There's an exquisite sopa de setas (soup of oyster mushrooms), or you could try the signature dish, enchiladas de picadillo con mole de olla (ground beef and raisin enchiladas with a savory local mole).

Just above the market, with a view of the main plaza, this plant-filled restaurant makes delicious regional cuisine served by a friendly staff. The envueltos de mole (chicken-filled tortillas covered in a thick, smoky mole sauce) are an excellent choice if you want to take a break from walking around the market and enjoy a snack. There is often live traditional music at lunchtime.

Italian food may just be Mexico's favorite international cuisine, but it's still rare to find house-made pasta that's as delicious and reasonably priced as the noodles served at this stylishly contemporary trattoria that draws foodies from far and near. Favorites include agnolotti stuffed with shrimp, mascarpone, and spring peas in a light olive oil-herb sauce, and tagliatelle with a rich short rib-and-red wine ragout. There's also a well-chosen list of mostly Italian wines. There's a second location in Zavaleta, on the west side of Puebla.