Four restaurants coming to a renovated Fresno building — one with top-rated breakfast

In order to tell you about downtown Fresno’s newest renovated historic building coming online, we first need to tell you about the top-rated chilaquiles you can get there.

There’s a new restaurant there — the first of what will be four — and it’s known for the Mexican breakfast dish. The chilaquiles are made from homemade tortilla chips slathered in a tomato-based red sauce, and eggs that ooze when you pop their yolks, all of which can be loaded onto a fork with a bite of refried beans, cotija cheese and sour cream.

The chilaquiles — and the rest of the Mexican restaurant’s menu — are from Las Mañanitas 2, the first restaurant to open in a food court inside a newly renovated Bitwise Industries building in downtown Fresno. Several more restaurants and a bar are coming in the next few weeks and months.

They are in the State Center Warehouse building at 747 R St., built in 1908. The two-story brick building is between Ventura and Tulare streets and was once used as a fruit-packing facility and cold storage building.

It will eventually be home to hundreds of Bitwise employees and others.

But it also has a food court that’s open to the public.

Dubbed the R Street Marketplace (with free parking across the street) it’s on the first floor with plenty of seating surrounded by several small restaurants.

Right now, Las Mañanitas is the only spot that’s open. It’s the same restaurant that has a location on the edge of downtown on Hazelwood Boulevard near Butler Avenue. (It’s also the same one that was ranked No. 10 in the nation by Yelp.com on a list of the best places to get brunch.)

The original Las Mañanitas will remain open.

Keep reading for a little more about its menu and hours, but first, here’s a look at the other restaurants coming to Bitwise’s State Center Warehouse.

They will open in phases, with most open by the end of February.

Coffee

Mosaic is a cafe specializing in coffee and grab-and-go items. In addition to coffee and espresso-based drinks, there will be fresh-squeezed juices.

Pastries will be baked in-house, and snacks, to-go breakfasts and light lunches also will be available.

It will likely open in the next week or two.

Hours: Regular hours will be 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. Mondays through Fridays, 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday and Sundays.

Pizza, beer and cocktails

Railway is a pizzeria and bar still under construction that will serve beer, wine, cocktails and mocktails.

Pizza can be purchased by the slice, or as a whole pie. It will have a Central California theme with traditional toppings such as pepperoni, but also Fresno chiles. There will be a “fig and pig,” pizza with fig and sausage toppings.

Pasta will also be available, along with weekend brunch.

Hours: Regular hours will be 11 a.m. to 9 pm Mondays through Thursdays, 11 a.m. to midnight Fridays, 10 a.m. to midnight Saturdays and 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Sundays.

Seafood

Aha Ahi is a poke bowl place with lots of seafood options. Expect bowls with rice where you pick your protein (fish, shrimp, scallops, etc.) veggies and other toppings.

It’s scheduled to open the first week of February.

The restaurant is owned by the same people who own Las Mañanitas, Allen Juarez and his wife, Anna. The space went without a tenant for a while.

“One day I finally said, ‘Can I have it? I’ll take it,’” he said.

His wife’s family is from Nayarit on the coast of Mexico, where seafood is a big part of life. They’ll bring that background and knowledge to the restaurant.

Their daughter, an airplane mechanic, will manage it.

Mexican food

As for Las Mañanitas 2, those chilaquiles are by far their No. 1 seller.

You can get them with the red sauce or ask for a green sauce made from tomatillos.

They’ll also ask you how spicy you want it. That determines how much of the “devil’s toe” — a spicy sauce made from fried chile de arbol — they stir into the chilaquiles sauce.

It’s made with cotija cheese (which Juarez calls the Mexican Parmesan), not the cheddar that many other restaurants use.

“Let’s just make it the way it’s supposed to be made,” Juarez said. “The basic thing is to bring those flavors to the table and don’t change them.”

Of course, there’s more than chilaquiles on the menu. It features breakfast and lunch food, including the popular chile verde. There’s also mañanitas bowls, where your choice of meat is combined with rice, beans, pico de gallo and avocado.

Aguas frescas are available, too, including horchata.

Las Mañanitas 2 is a big change for the owners. The existing location is just 800 square feet with five tables — and plenty of customers who poke their heads in the door and leave because it’s too crowded.

“As successful as Las Mañanitas has been, we can only do so much with the space we have,” Juarez said.

Gesturing to all the seating in the new food court and mentioning the option to get a beer with your food in a few weeks when the bar opens, he said, “You get to relax a little bit here.”

Details: Las Mañanitas is at 747 R St. inside Bitwise. Hours: 8:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. Tuesdays through Sundays.