{"id":320060,"date":"2026-05-17T14:24:11","date_gmt":"2026-05-17T14:24:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/320060\/"},"modified":"2026-05-17T14:24:11","modified_gmt":"2026-05-17T14:24:11","slug":"how-tabachines-became-fresnos-upscale-mexican-dining","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/320060\/","title":{"rendered":"How Tabachines became Fresno\u2019s upscale Mexican dining"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Inside Look is a Fresno Bee series<\/a> where we take readers behind the scenes at restaurants, new businesses, local landmarks and news stories.<\/p>\n

Every time the owner of Tabachines Cocina<\/a> in north Fresno encounters a challenge, she thinks about her mom.<\/p>\n

Her mother went to medical school while raising four daughters as a single mom in Guadalajara, Mexico before bringing the family to Fresno for a better life.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou have no excuse,\u201d restaurateur Consuelo Alvarado tells herself. \u201cKeep moving. Keep moving.\u201d<\/p>\n

That mantra has gotten her and the restaurant through tough times \u2014 grinding through two cars commuting to Los Angeles after opening her restaurant there in 2014. Then, not long after she moved the restaurant to Fresno in 2018, surviving the COVID-19 pandemic by serving sweaty customers on a makeshift patio.<\/p>\n

Twelve years after it was born, Tabachines is still trucking along. It\u2019s near Palm and Herndon avenues, in the same shopping center as Cracked Pepper Bistro<\/a> and Parma Ristorante<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Last week, readers chose Tabachines as the most high-end restaurant in town<\/a> in a Fresno Bee poll. It edged out Trelio<\/a> in Old Town Clovis at the last moment of voting.<\/p>\n

Tabachines Cocina restaurant \"The The bar and colorful decor are on display at Tabachines Cocina, located on the southwest corner of Herndon and Palm avenues in Fresno, which has been voted in a poll by Fresno Bee readers as the highest-end restaurant in town. CRAIG KOHLRUSS ckohlruss@fresnobee.com <\/p>\n

The name Tabachines (Taba-cheen-es) is a reference to the flame-red tabachin trees the owner grew up visiting in the main square in downtown Guadalajara.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen it\u2019s moving with the spring winds, it looks like it\u2019s on fire,\u201d she said \u2014 and artistic versions of that are all over the restaurant.<\/p>\n

Tabachines is a Mexican restaurant that doesn\u2019t fit neatly into any category.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s very elegant and hip. It\u2019s not like a hole-in-the-wall-type Mexican place,\u201d said Sisomvang Hernandez, a former member of Yelp\u2019s Elite Squad of active members of the review site.<\/p>\n

She puts it on par with Sabor Cocina Latina & Bar<\/a> in Fresno or CHICA<\/a> inside The Venetian in Las Vegas, or the popular Saizon<\/a> at the border of Fresno and Clovis.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut not a lot of people know about it,\u201d she said. \u201cIt doesn\u2019t feel like it\u2019s in Fresno.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tabachines\u2019 owner, Alvarado, is aiming to share the experience of eating at her mother\u2019s table.<\/p>\n

Elena Maravilla, now in her 80s, went to the market daily and cooked with whatever was in season for her daughters.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy mother always provided very fresh meals with a lot of vegetables, a lot of fruits,\u201d Alvarado said. \u201cMaybe a blessing in disguise, we didn\u2019t have a refrigerator. A refrigerator is a luxury in Mexico.\u201d<\/p>\n

After becoming a doctor, her mother brought the family to the United States when Alvarado was 17. Alvarado graduated from Clovis High School back when it was on Fifth Street and has called Fresno home ever since.<\/p>\n

She\u2019s never forgotten her Mexican heritage. She was a folkl\u00f3rico dancer for decades and never acquired a taste for American fast food.<\/p>\n

After a career in building single-family homes with her husband, she decided to bring her mother\u2019s way of cooking to a restaurant.<\/p>\n

Food and drink on the menu \"A A plate of beer-battered Alaskan halibut tacos are photographed at Tabachines Cocina, located on the southwest corner of Herndon and Palm avenues in Fresno, which has been voted in a poll by Fresno Bee readers as the highest-end restaurant in town. CRAIG KOHLRUSS ckohlruss@fresnobee.com <\/p>\n

The owner\u2019s mother\u2019s recipes show up on the menu, including her mole recipe, which rotates among proteins. Most recently, it was smothering the grilled Berkshire pork chop, served alongside an apricot salad.<\/p>\n

Tabachines chefs go the Vineyard Farmers Market twice a week, and the menu is based on whatever ingredients they find.<\/p>\n

So the $48 prime rib-eye, for example, is served with black beans, tomatoes from the market and Mexican onion.<\/p>\n

You\u2019ll also find a cucumber-fennel salad on the menu with local vegetables.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s also a $38 grilled Mary\u2019s Chicken breast served with Mayacoba beans popular in Mexican cooking, and $30 fish tacos that they tried and failed to take off the menu when customers rebelled. They\u2019re made from beer-battered wild Alaskan halibut, served on blue corn tortillas with chipotle crema, cabbage, pico de gallo, radish and microgreens.<\/p>\n

Food and beverage director Sam Aguilar said he likes to think of Tabachines as if it\u2019s a restaurant in a big city in Mexico. Not everything is traditional in Mexican eateries. They play with flavors there, too.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re in California. We have the bounty,\u201d he said. \u201cWe want to honor Mexican cuisines and also want to showcase dishes you wouldn\u2019t normally see.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s true in the bar also.<\/p>\n

There are more than 100 tequilas available, 100 bottles of mezcal and 150 kinds of wine \u2014 and lots of cocktails.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a cocktail that\u2019s not on the menu called the El Dorado. Bartender William Marshall wants customers to try it as part of his efforts to get people to drink mezcal, the smoky cousin of tequila.<\/p>\n

The drink is made with mezcal, tequila and a syrup made with Kingsburg Honey<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a very good introduction for people who have never had mezcal or aren\u2019t sure if they like it,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Back in the kitchen, there\u2019s only four people who work every shift (and they all share dishwashing duties).<\/p>\n

Chef Tyler Williams leads them, a Fresno native who brings his experience working in Napa and Yountville, including at Thomas Keller\u2019s Ad Hoc fried chicken restaurant, and local restaurants such as Cracked Pepper.<\/p>\n

Another way Tabachines defies pigeonholing?<\/p>\n

Williams didn\u2019t have Mexican cuisine experience when he started here seven years ago. He transitioned into taking over the kitchen when the founding chef was still there.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s exciting,\u201d Williams said. \u201cIt was something different that I just dove head first into.\u201d<\/p>\n

Alvarado \u2014 who rarely lets anything on the menu unless she falls in love with it \u2014 said she loved his attitude. Any skills he didn\u2019t have could be taught, she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cYoung people are fearless and I love that,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Details: Tabachines is at 6755 N. Palm Ave. Happy hour runs from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays, with dinner starting at 5 p.m. Tuesdays through Saturdays. Reservations<\/a> can be made online or by calling 559-473-1077<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"Chef Chef Tyler Williams prepares a plate of beer-battered Alaskan halibut tacos at Tabachines Cocina, located on the southwest corner of Herndon and Palm avenues in Fresno, which has been voted in a poll by Fresno Bee readers as the highest-end restaurant in town. CRAIG KOHLRUSS ckohlruss@fresnobee.com \"Tabachines Tabachines Cocina, located on the southwest corner of Herndon and Palm avenues in Fresno, has been voted in a poll by Fresno Bee readers as the highest-end restaurant in town. CRAIG KOHLRUSS ckohlruss@fresnobee.com
\n Related Stories from Fresno Bee<\/p>\n


\n \"Profile
\n <\/a><\/p>\n

Bethany Clough<\/a><\/p>\n

The Fresno Bee<\/p>\n

Bethany Clough covers restaurants and retail for The Fresno Bee. A reporter for more than 20 years, she now works to answer readers\u2019 questions about business openings, closings and other business news. She has a degree in journalism from Syracuse University and her last name is pronounced Cluff.\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Inside Look is a Fresno Bee series where we take readers behind the scenes at restaurants, new businesses,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":320061,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[112,114,113],"class_list":["post-320060","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fresno","tag-fresno","tag-fresno-headlines","tag-fresno-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/320060","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=320060"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/320060\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/320061"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=320060"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=320060"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=320060"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}