Upstairs, You’ll Eat Chile Pork Collar and Carnitas Tacos

Quiote is a joyous celebration of authentic Mexican food, mezcal and more mezcal in a warm bi-level space in Logan Square.

Its basement bar opens tonight, and its upstairs café/restaurant should follow in a week or two.

This slideshow proves its very existence.

Just thought you could use a little good news today, is all.

Moving on. Once the upstairs is open, you’ll swing by in the mornings for coffee and Mexican pastries, around lunch for some carnitas tacos and at dinnertime for hamachi aguachile and chile morita pork collar. They’ll also have a beer garden, come a season when it’s not really uncomfortably cold outside.

For the moment, though, you’ll hunker down with a date at a table next to the backlit cacti terrarium in the small, wood-swathed bar downstairs.

If it’s a cocktail you desire, you’ll select one of their mezcal-forward spins on traditional gin drinks (like a mezcal martini) from a menu designed with the help of a local Oaxacan barkeep.

If you’re a bit more serious about mezcal, you’ll opt for one or both of their curated tasting flights.

And if it’s a mole-spiked beer you seek, well…

That’s oddly specific, but they have that, too.