• Melissa Pasanen
• Eduardo Fuentes in Casa Real

A new Mexican restaurant called Casa Real will open by the end of November at 85 South Park Drive in Colchester, according to co-owner Eduardo Fuentes. The 150-seat restaurant space was most recently the Hideaway Steakhouse & Grill, which closed in July 2022 after one and a half years in business. Prior to that, it was Junior's Italian.

Fuentes is new to Vermont but not to the restaurant business, he said while taking a break from renovation work. The 30-year-old native of Guadalajara, Mexico, came to the United States when he was 15 and worked as a dishwasher in Louisiana. He now owns a small restaurant called La Casita Mexican Restaurant in Berlin, N.H., and will co-own Casa Real with Ricardo Guzman, who also has a restaurant in Maine.

The new restaurant's menu will resemble that of La Casita and feature "a little bit of everything," including seafood dishes and specialties such as quesabirria tacos, Fuentes said. The restaurateur said he sees an opportunity for authentic Mexican food in the area: "I already checked out the competition."

Fuentes also owns a construction company and has done his own renovations to the space, included tiling, painting and replacing most of the kitchen equipment. Learn more at Casa Real Mexican Restaurant on Facebook.

Correction: October 26, 2023: A previous version of this story misstated how long the restaurant space was vacant before Casa Real moved in. The Hideaway Steakhouse & Grill operated at that location for one and a half years before closing in July 2022.