East Idaho Eats: Senor Garcia’s Puerto Vallarta now at a new location, with an expanded menu

POCATELLO — Senor Garcia’s Puerto Vallarta restaurant is now serving its classic Tex-Mex food at a new location in Pocatello.

The new location, at the corner of Olympus Drive and Pocatello Creek Road, has been open since May, according to owner Nick Garcia, but will host an official ribbon-cutting next week.

As Garcia explained, the new location places his restaurant central to several hotels and just off Interstate 15. With easy access to a new flow of customers, Senor Garcia’s was able to do something its owner has long wanted — expand the menu to include breakfast.

“If you come in and you want pancakes, we’ll serve them,” Garcia told EastIdahoNews.com. “But if you come in and you want something different, you want a quesadilla, we got it here. That was the biggest reason we moved, we get to expand our menu — I love breakfast.”

The breakfast menu, like the lunch and dinner options, are deeply seeded in Garcia’s Texas roots. The meats are flavored using dry seasoning rather than marinades, and there is always the option to have a little extra spice added in the form of fresh jalapeno or serrano peppers.

Though spice can be added to almost everything on the menu, some of the items Senor Garcia’s serves, Garcia said, are made only for the fans of spicy food.

“If you like spicy food, try out rancherito,” he said, explaining that the dish is chicken, beef or shrimp cooked in a sauce made with a base of fresh roasted habanero peppers and is not listed on the menu. “It’s hot — when I say hot, you’re sweating — but it’s so good you won’t stop eating it. I got fried ice cream for when you’re done.”

Garcia had EastIdahoNews.com sample steak fajitas with rice and charro beans, and a “rico suave” table-made guacamole.

The fajitas were excellent, with tender strips of skirt steak sitting on a bed of onions and peppers still cooking in a bubbling butter sauce. Combined inside a warm tortilla with rice and charros, the fajitas were excellent.

While they are an excellent additive to your fajitas, the charro beans are fantastic by themselves — serving as a sort of bacon-cilantro Mexican bean soup.

The guacamole was rich and smooth with just a hint of spice. And to wash it all down, a whipped orange soda that Garcia says is a hit with anyone who tries it.

Like so many other area restaurants, COVID-19 forced Senor Garcia’s to change how it did business. In search of a way to survive, Garcia embraced social media and people’s affinity for YouTube-type videos.

The reason Garcia was able to move his restaurant across town as the economy continues to recover from the pandemic is because of his videos. Garcia explained through live videos posted to the restaurant’s Facebook page, he taught viewers how to make the dishes they were missing with the restaurant closed.

Over time, he began selling family packs of cold, prepared food with the instruction to watch the second part of those videos to properly build the prepped ingredients into the meals.

Garcia has decided to leave those videos on his Facebook feed, so fans can learn how he makes his popular dishes — like the enchiladas, molcajete and fajitas.

Find those videos on Facebook — here.

The menu is viewable at the company website — here.

Senor Garcia’s is open Monday to Thursday, 7 a.m. to 9 p.m., Friday and Saturday, 7 a.m. to 10 p.m., and Sunday, 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.

A ribbon-cutting and grand opening is scheduled for Nov. 10 at 5:15 p.m.

As a former law enforcement officer, Garcia is excited to involve all local agencies — Pocatello and Chubbuck police departments, Idaho State Police and the Bannock County Sheriff’s Office. During the ribbon-cutting, a massive 30-foot-by-20-foot flag will be raised by the color guards of those same local agencies.

“While the flag is being raised, we brought in a mariachi out of Salt Lake (City), they will be coming in, and they will be playing the National Anthem,” he said. “I think that’s awesome, I really do.”

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