Hanky Panky

The Ritual of the Reveal

Mexico City's cocktail culture has a particular relationship with ceremony. Where other cities lean on minimalism or theatrics for their own sake, the better bars here fold presentation into something that feels closer to genuine hospitality — the drink arrives as a considered gesture, not a performance. Hanky Panky sits at the sharper end of that tradition. As the city's first speakeasy, the bar established a template that many venues since have borrowed from: the concealed entrance, the deliberate slowing-down of pace, and the sense that crossing the threshold requires some effort and rewards it accordingly.

The address, Turín 52 in the Juárez district, does not announce itself loudly. Juárez itself has become one of the city's most active neighbourhoods for bars and restaurants over the past decade — a grid of tree-lined streets between Reforma and Álvaro Obregón that carries a distinct energy, neither the tourist density of the Centro nor the self-conscious cool of Condesa. Within that context, Hanky Panky operates as a fixed point: the place that arrived before the neighbourhood's current reputation and that has, if anything, grown more confident as the area has filled in around it.

A Program Built on Distance Traveled

The drinks philosophy at Hanky Panky draws from travel , specifically, from the idea that a bartender who has moved through the world's cocktail cultures brings something home that cannot be replicated by staying put. This is a common enough claim across the global bar circuit, but the specificity of execution matters. What distinguishes the program here is the insistence on resolving that international influence through Mexican ingredients and technique. The result is not fusion in any diffuse sense but something closer to a translation: global reference points rendered in local material, with the hospitality remaining thoroughly, recognisably Mexican throughout.

This tension between outward-looking influence and rootedness in place is one of the more productive arguments in contemporary cocktail making. Bars that get it right produce menus that feel both cosmopolitan and specific. Bars that get it wrong produce menus that feel like airport lounges. Hanky Panky's sustained ranking in the World's 50 Best Bars programme , No. 12 globally in 2021, No. 22 in 2023, and continuing its presence in the global list through 2024 , suggests the balance has been consistently maintained.

The Numbers Behind the Rankings

Award trajectories tell their own kind of story. Hanky Panky entered the World's 50 Best Bars global ranking at No. 12 in 2021, a position that placed it immediately in the upper tier of the list rather than at its edge. By 2023 it held No. 22 globally and No. 20 in North America. The 2024 and 2025 rankings show a positional adjustment , No. 93 globally and No. 35 in North America for 2025 , that reflects both an expanding field and the natural volatility of peer competition as the category grows. The Top 500 Bars ranking places it at No. 62 globally in 2025, a credential that places it well inside the upper band of the international bar circuit rather than at its margins.

For context: the World's 50 Best Bars list has added more regional and global entrants over the past three years, meaning a drop in absolute number does not indicate a drop in standard. A bar that holds a position in the global top 100 across five consecutive years has done something more meaningful than one that spiked and disappeared. Consistency at that level, within a category that turns over quickly, is a more useful signal than a single high placement.

Among Mexico City's peer set, this record places Hanky Panky in a distinct competitive bracket. Baltra Bar, Bar Mauro, Bijou Drinkery Room, and Brujas each represent different approaches to the city's drinking culture, but none carry the same unbroken international ranking history. That longevity shapes the experience in practical terms: the bar operates within a set of expectations that have been tested and maintained, not assembled for the occasion.

Pace and Protocol

The speakeasy format, when it works, does something specific to the rhythm of a visit. The small or concealed entrance slows arrival. The interior, usually more intimate than a conventional bar, enforces a closer relationship between guest and bartender. The act of having found the place , even when everyone knows where it is , adds a mild sense of occasion that shapes how people approach the first drink. Hanky Panky's format engages this logic. The bar opens at 18:00 Tuesday through Saturday, running through to 02:00, a schedule that positions it as a considered evening destination rather than a casual drop-in. The middle hours, between 21:00 and midnight, tend to carry the most social weight in Mexico City's bar culture: early enough to precede a late dinner, late enough to follow one.

The ritual of ordering in a bar like this is worth understanding before arrival. The better approach is to describe a reference point , a spirit, a flavour direction, a classic drink you return to , rather than scanning a menu for something familiar. Bars that have built programs around travel-informed technique typically produce their most interesting work when the bartender has some latitude. A request anchored to Mexican spirits, given the bar's stated commitment to domestic ingredients, is likely to yield something more expressive than a standard specification.

Placing Hanky Panky in Mexico's Broader Bar Map

Mexico's cocktail culture extends well beyond the capital. El Gallo Altanero in Guadalajara represents a different tradition, rooted in agave country's own relationship with spirits. La Capilla in Tequila offers something closer to a living historical document , a bar where the batanga was invented and the bartender who made it served for decades. Bekeb in San Miguel de Allende and Arca in Tulum each work within distinct regional registers. Further afield, Aruba Day Drink in Tijuana points to how different Mexico's northern border bar culture is from its capital equivalent. Coco Bongo in Cancun represents the large-format entertainment end of the spectrum, operating in a different category entirely.

Hanky Panky occupies the craft end of this spread , technically precise, internationally recognised, and rooted in an urban, neighbourhood-specific context. For visitors working through our full Mexico City guide, it functions as a reference point: a bar that has defined what serious cocktail making looks like in the city, and against which newer arrivals are implicitly measured. Internationally, the comparison set reaches bars like Bar Leather Apron in Honolulu , venues that hold sustained global rankings through consistent program discipline rather than novelty.

Planning a Visit

Hanky Panky operates Tuesday to Saturday, opening at 18:00 and running until 02:00. The Juárez neighbourhood is accessible from the Insurgentes and Cuauhtémoc metro stations, and the address on Turín places it within walking distance of the neighbourhood's wider concentration of bars and restaurants. Given the bar's sustained international profile, a booking , where the format permits it , is worth securing in advance, particularly for Thursday through Saturday evenings. Google reviews place it at 4.3 across close to 2,000 responses, a score that reflects a broad visitor base rather than a specialist audience, and suggests the experience holds across different levels of cocktail literacy.

What should I drink at Hanky Panky?

The bar's stated philosophy draws from global travel while keeping Mexican ingredients central. That combination points toward spirits rooted in Mexico , mezcal, tequila, or less familiar agave expressions , interpreted through internationally informed technique. Rather than ordering from a list by name alone, describing a flavour profile or a classic reference drink typically produces more interesting results at bars operating at this level. The sustained World's 50 Best Bars recognition, including a No. 12 global ranking in 2021 and continued top-100 placement through 2025, indicates the program has the depth to reward that kind of open-ended request. Whichever direction you go, the hospitality, which the bar consistently frames as specifically Mexican in character, will shape the experience at least as much as the liquid itself.