Chef’s Fresco Mexicano moves to new Lakeport location

Chef Sean O’Rourke is planning on bringing Mexican cuisine with his “own little twist” to Lakeport with his new Chef’s Fresco Mexicano location.

The restaurant at 7116 Lakeshore Road had its final inspection scheduled Monday andO'Rourke planned to open for “taco Tuesday” the following day. He's planning on having a grand opening July 3.

“I’m pretty stoked,” he said.

O’Rourke, 52, said he started cooking in a kitchen when he was 12 and is a certified chef through the American Culinary Federation. He opened Chef’s Fresco Mexicano in 2019 at 7023 Lakeshore Road after operating WOK Inn BBQ there for five years.

“Then we got too big for that location,” he said.

With the new location, which was Kelly Joy’s Smokehouse before it moved to Worth Township, he has a larger flattop to get food done more quickly and efficiently. He said there was a lot of cleaning to do with the move but now he's reached the easy part, just buying fresh ingredients to make good food.

“We’ve cleaned her up, made her look pretty,” he said.

The restaurant’s hours will be 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Sunday and 11 am. to 8 p.m. Tuesday and Thursday through Saturday. It will offer carryout and countertop service, so people can order food and sit down in the restaurant, but a server won’t come to the table.

O’Rourke said the menu includes puffy tacos, where he fries a flour shell that “puffs up like a pillow” and then fills with ingredients.

He vertically roasts meat and shaves thin pieces off it like shawarma and has lime, fresh pico de gallo, cilantro and guacamole for meals. The menu includes a “magic dragon taco” with magic sauce and there’s a variety of salsas, including a “melt your face” one.

“These are my own special little toppings for tacos,” O'Rourke said.

Eric Klump, a Burtchville Township resident who lives right around the corner from Chef’s Fresco Mexicano’s new location and visited its previous spot, said the restaurant has a good selection of salsas and his favorite menu item is the puffy tacos.

He said it’s nice to drive less than two miles to get puffy tacos when before he had to drive over 10 miles to get them.

“We like doing taco Tuesdays in our house,” he said, and he did plan to go to Chef's Fresco Mexicano on its opening day.

Klump said the restaurant is joining several other cuisines nearby, with American at Lakeport Tavern, barbecue at Lakeshore Smokehouse and coneys at Big George’s Coney Island.

“We’ve actually got a variety now to choose from,” he said.

O’Rourke thinks people will stop at the restaurant on their way to Lexington to get a big taco box and he thinks people will come from the nearby Lakeport State Park Campground Campground for “tacos and camping.”

The restaurant gets people from Port Huron, Fort Gratiot, Yale and Lexington and now he and staff are smack in the middle of them and ready to start serving in the new location, he said.

“We’re all very excited to make some delicious Mexican cuisine,” O'Rourke said.

People can find out more on Chef’s Fresco Mexicano’s Facebook page and can call the restaurant at (810) 712-7125.

Contact Bryce Airgood at (810) 989-6202 or bairgood@gannett.com. Follow her on Twitter @bairgood123.