Mapped: New and moved restaurants in 2014

Grant Bennett  of Eclectic Cafe is the latest restaurateur to jump into Tucson’s pizza frenzy.

Bennett hopes to open the flagship of Pionic Pizza, which he is confident will grow into a chain of restaurants with locations outside of Tucson.

“We are convinced that what we are doing is going to work and it’s going to be incredibly popular,” said Bennett, who plans to open his first Pionic Pizza in a 3,000-square-foot building at 2643 N. Campbell Ave. that used to house Sparkle Cleaners. The restaurant could be open as early as late June or early July, he said.

Pionic will specialize in single-serving, fast-casual pizzas that customers will order much as they would at Subway or Chipotle. Customers will select from different doughs, cheeses, sauces, meats and veggies then wait for no more than three minutes while their individual pizza is baked in an oven heated to 800 or 900 degrees.

Pizzas will cost around $7.

Bennett’s opening could come just a few weeks ahead of California upstart Pizza Studio, which is opening a shop in the retail cluster of the new University of Arizona student housing tower at 1031 N. Park Ave. Owner Trace Biskin, a former UA offensive lineman and the son of the restaurant’s founder, said construction begins next month. He plans to open in July.

Bennett said he believes there is room in the Tucson market for Pionic Pizza and Pizza Studio and “many more like me.”

“I think we are redefining the way that people think about pizza. It’s not just Chicago vs. New York style now,” he said, noting that his competition will not be the neighborhood pizza joint that delivers but the corner made-to-order sandwich shop.

“This is something that the city hasn’t seen before,” he added. “It’s going to be fast-casual pizza. We are going to try to be the first.”

Biskin, who earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the UA, said he also plans to open multiple Tucson locations. Pizza Studio operates under the same basic concept as Pionic except that pizzas are baked in a conveyor belt oven, Biskin said.

Biskin’s father, Ron, opened the first Pizza Studio in 2012 in Los Angeles. There are nearly 40 franchises in development.

Hi Fi Kitchen & Cocktails is opening its Tucson outpost downtown on Thursday, offering chef-crafted food, adult milkshakes and beer floats.

It’s the latest eatery/bar to open in the now bustling Congress Street entertainment corridor. Hi Fi, which has a year-old sister in Scottsdale, takes up 8,000 square feet of Plaza Centro complex at 345 E. Congress St. By day, it’s a restaurant serving salads, burgers and small plates, priced from $6 to $16, with 35 HDTVs airing all manner of sports.

At night, it morphs into a 21-and-older thumping, bumping club with a high-tech digital graffiti wall flashing nonstop 3-D images. Patrons are carded and a dress code — no excessively baggy pants, athletic wear, head gear, sandals or sneakers — is imposed at night, usually beginning around 9 p.m.

On Sunday, Hi Fi will host its first live event with electronica DJ duo Caked Up. Admission is free and the show begins around 6 p.m.

Hi Fi will open at 8 p.m. Thursday. Its hours will be 11 a.m. to 2 a.m. Mondays through Fridays, and 10 a.m. to 2 a.m. Saturdays and Sundays, when they serve brunch.

Read more restaurant and club news in Thursday's Caliente.

Wine, craft beer and local breads are selected to complement the variety of cut-to-order specialty cheeses at the recently opened Blu — A Wine and Cheese Stop, located at the Mercado San Agustín on West Congress Street at Avenida del Convento.

The stand-alone shop features certified cheese mongers who know everything about the cheese they are selling — from the milk it’s made of to the cheese makers themselves — and pass that information along to customers as they try samples before they buy.

“It’s a way to give voice to the small farmer,” said Tana Fryer, cheese monger and owner of Blu.

Along with its retail cut-to-order cheese, wine and beer, the new shop offers sandwiches and salads, as well as a wine bar. It carries between 30 and 40 different cheeses at any given time, 85 percent to 90 percent of them domestic.

Fryer became passionate about the cheese-making process after working for Pastoral Artisan Cheese, Bread and Wine in Chicago, where she spent time with dairy farmers and cheese makers, learning the nitty-gritty of how cheese is made.

That passion turned into a business when Fryer moved back to Tucson and couldn’t find the cheeses she had gotten used to, and “people who wanted to give voice to the small farmers.”

Blu was born when Fryer took a catering job for an event at downtown’s Fox Tucson Theatre and she had to find the type of foods she wanted. From there, she began working with restaurants to help them understand and purchase better cheeses.

Reilly Craft Pizza & Drink was one of her first restaurant clients. Fryer does regular tastings with Reilly and adds to the list of cheeses on its popular chef’s board. She provides training to the restaurant’s staff on how to talk about the products. “Our goal is that the people serving the cheese can talk about it,” Fryer said. “Tell you more than it’s a bleu or a cheddar.”

“Her product is exceptional ... just about better than anything we’ve tasted,” said Jay Zimmermann, general manager of Reilly. “We’ve gone through European imports and done a lot of tastings, so for us to think she has the best says quite a bit.”

Reilly’s customers like to have access to things that are from local businesses, Zimmermann added.

Blu’s next move was selling cheese inside of Alfonso’s Olive Oils on Sundays as part of the farmers market at St. Philip’s Plaza. In November 2013, Blu opened full time in Alfonso’s, offering artisanal cheese, specialty meats, accompaniments and gift boxes.

Since Blu was also selling its products at the Mercado San Augustín Farmers Market and working out of the Mercado Kitchen for catering jobs, it made sense to open a stand-alone store there. It opened at the end of January.

Just a few weeks after the Mercado opening, Blu opened a third location inside Alfonso’s Olive Oil’s new store at North Oracle and Magee roads.

Between the three stores, Blu employs 13 people.

Fryer said even though she stocks wine and cheese from all over the world, she also purchases products from local cheese makers and wineries, and has recently become a supplier of Southern Arizona’s Fiore di Capra goat cheese, which comes from Pomerene, near Benson. “It allows people to know what’s going on here.”

“It’s been a crazy, wonderful few months,” Fryer said. “We have kept walking through doors that seem to open up partnerships that make sense.”

Native New Yorker has dropped “New Yorker” from its logo and is now simply going by Native.

The move comes amid the realization by the Phoenix-based company’s top management that its customers already referred to the pizza and wing restaurant as “Native.” The company’s official name is Native Grill and Wings.

Native, whose Buffalo, N.Y.-inspired menu also includes buffalo wings, beef-on-weck sandwiches and Friday fish frys, has two Tucson area locations: 8225 Courtney Paige Way in Marana; and 3100 E. Speedway.

See more restaurant news in Thursday's Caliente.

Domino’s Pizza opened a 1,200-square-foot store at 901 E. Speedway that boasts a new design, described as “pizza theater.”

The new concept has a more open floor plan that allows customers to view the pizza-making process. There’s also a lobby where customers can track carryout orders electronically on a screen.

The project cost about $400,000 after renovations were made to what once was a Sparkle Cleaners.

The new design concept will be rolled out in Domino’s stores across the nation in the next three years, said Tareq Hishmeh, franchise owner.

It is the second store in Tucson to incorporate the new design. The first, at Speedway and Campbell, has a dining room, which Domino’s does not traditionally have, Hishmeh said.

“The entire look and feel is more open and more inviting, and better lit,” Hishmeh said. “The last time Domino’s Pizza had a new image was in the early ’90s, and the stores that haven’t been updated need that love.”

Hishmeh, who owns all 22 Domino’s pizza stores in Tucson, said that in the next two years every existing store in Tucson will have the new pizza theater design. “The new design shows off what we’re most proud of,” he said. “Our employees.”

The new store employs about 25 full- and part-time staff members.

The Tucson franchise company, Team Arizona Pizza Inc., is looking to hire another 50 pizza delivery drivers for all of its stores. Delivery drivers earn an average of $15 to $18 per hour, when mileage and tips are included, Hishmeh said. Those interested in employment can apply at applyatdominos.com online.

The company has about 475 employees in the Tucson area.

It seems like almost every month I’m writing about a new brewery in Tucson. This month it’s two.

John Adkisson is bringing a whole new concept to the Tucson beer scene with Iron John’s Brewing Co. Rather than a traditional brewery with a tasting room and off premise sales to restaurants in kegs, he’s only going to sell bottled beer from his brewery. No kegs, no growlers. Just 750 ml (25 oz.) returnable bottles with sealable flip tops.

He believes this model will “maximize revenues.” The longtime home brewer is a management accountant by trade.

There will be no tasting at his brewery, 245 S. Plumer Ave., as city zoning does not allow on-premises consumption. The 1,200-square-foot brewery contains a two-barrel system that will produce a stout, an IPA, strong ale and a “mellow and easy” beer, as well as a rotating seasonal such as a Belgian or a barrel-aged brew.

There will be a kickoff event at Tap and Barrel, 403 N. Sixth Ave., on March 6. Iron John’s bottles will also be available for sale at Tap and Bottle

.

Kyle Jefferson is bringing a more traditional model to downtown. He is opening Pueblo Vida Brewing at 115 E. Broadway in mid- to late April with a seven-barrel brewing system. He’ll initially brew a northwest style IPA that he describes as “citrus forward,” Belgium style beers and a Bavarian hefeweizen. He said he’ll brew some “true European-style beers,” like the hefeweizen, “not normally available fresh in Tucson.”

Jefferson, a University of Arizona grad in finance, spent almost two years working for a brewery in Washington state. Seeing Tucson’s downtown resurgence, Jefferson decided to build a taproom and brewery there. The taproom will only serve Pueblo Vida beer at first. Customers can order food from a nearby restaurant, which will deliver to Pueblo Vida.

* * *

These two new breweries with very different business models are continuing evidence of the growth of good beer in Tucson. And interestingly, both of these new brewers have finance backgrounds. They have no doubt done informed financial projection and believe the Tucson market can support additional breweries.

This is great not only for those of us who enjoy good beer, but also for the Tucson economy. There must be easily 200 people employed in the beer business in Tucson. Most of these are relatively new jobs. Keep ’em coming!

* * *

The Brewers Association reports that at the end of 2013 there were 2,722 breweries in the U.S., up 400 from 2012. Ninety-eight percent of the breweries are small and independent operations.

* * *

And for the record: The folks at Arizona Brewers Guild advise that it is their organization, not Craft Tucson as I reported in January, that oversees events in Tucson during Arizona Beer Week, which was Feb. 15-22.



Scottsdale nightclub impresario Les Corieri is bringing his latest concept to downtown Tucson.

Corieri will open Hi-Fi Kitchen and Cocktails in a 6,150-square-foot space — 8,000 square feet when you add in the patio — at 345 E. Congress St., on the street level of the downtown Plaza Centro Garage. He expects to be open in six weeks, he said Tuesday.

Hi-Fi, which Corieri and his Evening Entertainment Group partner/wife Diane Corieri opened in Scottsdale last March, features a $250,000 state-of-the-art big-screen digital graffiti system that flashes morphing 3-D images.

“We blew people’s minds because what we have created has never been done. It hasn’t even been done in Las Vegas,” Les Corieri said. “It soon will be when they figure out the technology.”

The digital graffiti, projected onto a trio of 20-inch screens set up on a 50-foot wall using three high-tech digital projectors, will go on after 10 nightly. During the day, Hi-Fi will split its personality between cozy, warm restaurant/bar serving scratch-made twists on comfort food classics — a pretzel roll substitutes for rye bread in the Reuben; meatballs cozy up to mac and cheese; and a sunny-side-up egg tops a burger — to evening sports bar with 35 55-inch TVs and a trio of 20-foot screens blasting everything from football to boxing and baseball.

“At night, 10 o’clock, 11 o’clock, that customer is looking for something that’s exciting, something that draws your attention and makes you feel like you have energy, so to speak,” Corieri said. “And this (digital graffiti) wall creates more energy than any light show in Las Vegas.”

Tucson Realty and Trust CEO Hank Amos, who has a summer home near Corieri’s in Idaho, said he has been trying for 15 years to get his friend to open a club in Tucson. Corieri said until now he hasn’t felt that the timing was right or the town was ready.

“But when we came up with the Hi-Fi concept, I said, ‘This can work. This will work in any city that we take it to,’ ” he said.

“It’s a big deal. … They are literally the tops of what they do,” said Amos, who brokered the Tucson deal for Corieri with his colleague Pat Darcy. “He’s created a nightlife in Scottsdale … and made all that energy.”

Tucson developer Jim Campbell, who is developing the retail portion of The Cadence student housing complex downtown and the Plaza Centro Garage across the street, said Corieri signed a seven-year lease in December with options for 14 additional years.

“I was looking for the bookend for the east end of downtown. I needed something that would finish activating the east end of downtown and Hi-Fi is the perfect fit for that,” Campbell said.

Hi-Fi joins World Of Beer and Gio Taco, two businesses already operating in The Cadence retail space. Campbell said he will have one space left in the garage after Planet Smoothie, Fed By Threads and Cut/Color/Polish salon open in the space next to Hi-Fi.

Corieri’s Evening Entertainment has been developing restaurant and nightclub concepts in the Scottsdale area for more than 25 years. In addition to Hi-Fi, it has The Mint nightclub and RnR restaurant and club, both in Scottsdale; and two Sandbar Mexican Grill restaurants in Phoenix and Chandler.

An upstart California fast-casual pizza chain is booming into the Tucson market with plans to open at least five locations over the next three years.

The Pizza Studio’s maiden Tucson restaurant could open as early as June at 1031 N. Park Ave., in the center of a cluster of University of Arizona student housing complexes. The restaurant will be next door to the former home of a Domino’s pizza shop, near East Speedway.

The year-old chain also has a development deal in Phoenix that includes 20 locations over the next five years, the first of which will be downtown and is expected to open in March.

Judging by the influx of new restaurants in the past year, pizza has apparently replaced the burger as Tucson’s latest culinary obsession. In October, Aaron May opened Heist Pizza Parlour at 7131 E. Broadway, coming months after Ari Shapiro introduced his artisan pizza shop Falora Pizza & Espresso at 3000 E. Broadway in early 2013. Coming next: James Beard-winning pizza chef Chris Bianco will open Pizzeria Bianco at 272 E. Congress St. later this month or in early March.

Tucson salad and sandwich shop Choice Greens introduced a create-your-own pizza to its menu of salads and sandwiches in mid-January at its 2829 E. Speedway location; it has a second location at 4205 N. Campbell Ave.  The thin-crust pizzas, available daily after 3 p.m., are baked in a high-temperature oven that cooks the pies in three minutes or less, co-owner Paolo DeFilippis said.

Choice Greens’ pizza has been a year in the works and is designed to complement the restaurant’s salads, not replace them.

“It’s important that we remain a chopped-salad restaurant that serves pizza,” DeFilippis said. “Pizza is something that a lot of customers crave. It crosses all demographics as well. It’s families; it’s teenagers; it’s college students. It crosses the board.”

The Pizza Studio, the brainchild of California businessman Samit Varma, is in the early stages of a franchise frenzy with nearly 150 outposts under development for 2014. The company is not just opening one or two locations in a market; it’s opening dozens. San Diego, already saturated with more than 1,000 pizza restaurants, will get 20 within the next five years, according to the San Diego Union-Tribune.

The Pizza Studio opened its first restaurant in January 2013 in Los Angeles, across from the University of Southern California. The company fancies itself as pizza’s fast-casual answer to build-your-own sandwiches. Customers can “Create Your Own Masterpiece” by selecting from a plethora of meats, cheeses and vegetables and a handful of crusts, much as you would when you order a sandwich at Subway. Eleven-inch pies are $7.99 for unlimited toppings and $5.99 for one- or two-item ready-made “Starving Artists” pies.

The Arizona restaurants are franchise operations, a company spokeswoman said.

An upstart California fast-casual pizza chain is booming into the Tucson market with plans to open at least five locations over the next three years.

The Pizza Studio’s maiden Tucson restaurant could open as early as June at 1031 N. Park Ave., in the center of a cluster of University of Arizona student housing complexes. The restaurant will be next door to the former home of a Domino’s pizza shop, near East Speedway.

The 2-year-old chain founded in 2012, first restaurant opened 2013 Pizza Studio chain also has a development deal in Phoenix that includes 20 locations over the next five years, the first of which will be located downtown and is expected to open in March.

Judging by the influx of new restaurants in the past year, pizza has apparently replaced the burger as Tucson's latest culinary obsession. Last October, Aaron May opened Heist Pizza Parlour at 7131 E. Broadway, coming months after Ari Shapiro introduced his artisan pizza shop Falora Pizza & Espresso at 3000 E. Broadway in early 2013. Coming next: James Beard-winning pizza chef Chris Bianco will open Pizzeria Bianco at 272 E. Congress St. later this month or in early March.

Pizza Studio, though, is the most aggressive entrant to the market. The company, the brainchild of California businessman Samit Varma, is in the early stages of a franchise frenzy with nearly 150 outposts under development for 2014. The company is not just opening one or two locations in a market; it's opening dozens. San Diego, already saturated with more than 1,000 pizza restaurants, will get 20 within the next five years, according to the San Diego Union-Tribune.

Pizza Studio opened its first restaurant in January 2013 in Los Angeles, across from the University of Southern California. The company fancies itself as pizza’s fast-casual answer to build-your-own sandwiches. Customers can “Create Your Own Masterpiece” by selecting from a plethora of meats, cheeses and vegetables and a handful of crusts, much as you would when you order a sandwich at Subway. Eleven-inch pies are $7.99 for unlimited toppings and $5.99 for one- or two-item ready-made “Starving Artists” pies.

The Arizona restaurants are franchise operations, a company spokeswoman said.

A worker spreads corn masa on a lineup of dried corn husks, plops scoops of spicy meat filling on top of each one and then deftly rolls and folds the product into gloriously tasty bundles.

Multiply that process a million times over a year — and throw in hours a day of mixing, cooking and chopping to prep ingredients — and you get an idea of what goes on at Tucson Tamale Co.

Making tamales is part art, part kitchen science and a lot of loving labor, but doing it right has driven a fast-growing enterprise — and vaulted Tucson Tamale into the consciousness of foodies nationwide.

“One of our advantages is, it is a difficult process, so it’s difficult for others to replicate it,” said Todd Martin, who co-owns Tucson Tamale Co. with his wife, Sherry. “On the other hand, it is difficult — we literally spent two years getting the process down.”

Refining the traditional process of making tamales and adding various flavors and healthful ingredients helped the Martins redefine tamales as a gourmet food item.

And the concept has been a hit: The company has thrived despite the slack economy and is expanding to meet demand.

Founded in 2008 in a midtown storefront, Tucson Tamale on Saturday celebrated the grand opening of its second restaurant, at 7159 E. Tanque Verde Road, and the company is scouting out a third site in Oro Valley.

And thanks to national media exposure spanning TV, the Internet and print, the company has built a thriving online business. To meet demand, the company is ramping up production from about 230,000 tamales in 2010 to a conservative projection of 1.2 million this year, Todd Martin said, adding that the company plans to open a regional distribution center in the Denver area by next year.

Much of the company’s growth has been through shipping orders through phone and online sales, fueled by rave reviews on websites such as Yelp and TripAdvisor, social media and exposure through a cable-TV show, online foodie media including Roadfood.com and print outlets including Parade magazine.

“Social media has really been huge for us,” Sherry Martin said. “We have people who are really passionate about our tamales.”

But success didn’t come overnight, and the venture was a bit of a gamble.

After moving from San Diego to Tucson in 1995 to be closer to Sherry, Todd got a job in phone sales at Intuit and worked his way up to become a manager at the accounting software giant’s customer and technical support center in Tucson. Sherry had already established herself as a manager of the privacy-policy unit at the Fortune 500 company.

“We were both comfortable, making sweet salaries,” Sherry recalled.

But starting a restaurant or other business was always in the long-term plan for Todd, 55, a self-described “serial entrepreneur” who started selling bubble gum in the eighth grade, and later owned a restaurant in Denver.

By the mid-2000s, the Martins had been considering a fresh-deli market concept. The tamale idea popped up quite by accident when a visitor left a tamale cookbook as a present, knowing the Martins’ affinity for tamales.

A couple of weeks later, still turning business ideas over in his head, Todd spotted the cookbook lying on a table and it dawned on him: “I looked at it and said, ‘That’s it, we’re going to make tamales,’ ” he said.

It made sense to Sherry, who noted that tamales, like sandwiches, can be packed with anything to create unique flavors.

“Corn is really just a vessel to deliver deliciousness, like a sandwich,” she said.

And tamales were something the Martins knew something about. Tamales were a family tradition for Sherry, 49, who grew up in Tucson and is part Hispanic on her mother’s side.

She recalled getting a crew of family members and friends together to make tamales around the holidays — a tradition that Todd readily embraced.

By 2008, after testing the concept on some friends, the Martins were ready to take the plunge, sinking $100,000 into their first shop at 2545 E. Broadway, Todd recalled.

The timing was tricky at best, as the economy took a steep dive as the real estate market and Wall Street melted down in October 2008 at the onset of the Great Recession.

“People would say, ‘I really like these, but I can’t spend any money,’ ” Todd said.

Gradually, word got out, and despite the still-slow economy the business has been growing on a year-over-year basis ever since.

“It’s been a very steady climb,” Todd said.

The company’s frozen-tamale-shipping business stemmed from a request by a woman from New York who tasted Tucson Tamale’s wares while visiting the area and wanted some shipped home, Todd recalled.

When he called back to tell the woman he could ship her $72 order out via FedEx overnight but shipping would cost $120, he was surprised when she didn’t flinch, he recalled. The company can now ship the same size order via second-day air service for just $26.

Online sales have been driven by a stream of exposure from the foodie media.

Tucson Tamale is consistently in the top handful of Tucson-area restaurants rated by the online review site TripAdvisor.com, and it’s also benefited from good reviews on Yelp and a listing in at least one major travel guide.

The power of positive media exposure became apparent in 2011, when the company was featured on the Cooking Channel’s artisan-food show “FoodCrafters.” After the show aired, the company got 700 orders within three days, Todd recalled.

The company also was featured on the website Roadfood.com and in one of Roadfood’s regular segments on National Public Radio’s “The Splendid Table” show in 2010. (Roadfood.com has reviewed and recommended many Tucson standbys, including El Charro and Café Poca Cosa.) Tucson Tamale also got a pop after being mentioned in a holiday gift story in the weekly newspaper insert Parade magazine, which had a 2012 circulation of 33 million.

Michael Stern of Roadfood.com and his wife and partner, Jane (a former Tucson resident), came across Tucson Tamale during their travels in 2008 and were impressed by the creativity and care the Martins put into their food.

“The moment we walked in and looked around, we said, ‘This is very interesting,’ ” said Michael Stern, who with his wife has been traveling the country since 1978, seeking out the best regional food for their website and periodic Roadfood print guides.

“He has this concept of a tamale being, I won’t say a blank slate, but as this malleable thing you can do absolutely anything with.”

Stern said the kind of viral publicity Tucson Tamale is enjoying can be a two-edged sword, however, citing some small eateries that have gained instant Internet fame but failed to capitalize because rapid expansion eroded service or they couldn’t scale up to meet demand.

“Fortunately, Todd I think has the acumen to deal with it,” Stern said.

Today, the company can produce 2,400 tamales a day at its Broadway location with a crew of four tamale “rollers” and a prep cook, and 300 or so at its new tamalería on Tanque Verde Road.

The Martins, who now employ about 45 people, have big expansion plans but are moving forward cautiously.

Todd said the decision to locate the planned distribution center in Denver was made partly so he can spend more time with his family and 87-year mother, who live in the area, and shipping costs are cheaper there.

Todd said the Martins are actively scouting for a suitable Oro Valley restaurant location, but if they can’t sign a lease by May or so, they’ll put off any opening until after the October-through-December holiday sales crush.

For now, the couple is enjoying the success and the significant local following and support.

“Something that has been so joyful for us is that so many people want us to succeed — there are so many people just rooting for us,” Sherry said.

A new destination for brunch, lunch and produce has filled the empty building space next to Café Desta downtown.

The 5 Points Market & Restaurant opened last week at 756 S. Stone Ave.

Owned and operated by Brian Haskins and his partner Jasper Ludwig, the eatery is only serving brunch its first couple of weeks, with lunch options available by the end of the month.

“We are making simple things,” Haskins said. “But they are really well made, with good ingredients.”

Among the selections offered: a warm chia pudding ($5), with coconut milk, caramelized banana, pecan and brown sugar, and a breakfast salad ($8), with roasted butternut squash, roasted chiles, over medium eggs, Welsh white cheddar, arugula, heirloom tomatoes and herbs.

Haskins said the most popular plates so far are the smoked salmon Benedict and the huevos rancheros.

“I think you have to have huevos rancheros on the menu if you live in Tucson,” Haskins said.

Dishes use locally sourced ingredients based on their availability.

Before opening 5 Points, Haskins was the deli manager at Time Market on East University Boulevard. Ludwig still works as a manager at Café Passe on North Fourth Avenue.

They modeled their new venture after Sage’s Brunch House, a popular eatery in Olympia, Wash.

The couple moved from Olympia three years ago.

Customers can eat on the patio at 5 Points or inside at tables on hardwood floors amid exposed brick walls. The diner style kitchen area runs along the restaurant’s north wall.

Free-standing metal shelves and freezers toward the rear of the restaurant offer a selection of organic groceries, produce and other staples.

“It is a beautiful space,” Haskins said. “An amazing place to be.”

Haskins and Ludwig do not plan to have dinner service, but they are exploring the possibility of obtaining a liquor license for private parties and other musical events in the evenings.

Before 5 Points opened, the space was being used for occasional concerts and a tango night held twice a month. Those will continue.

“We are on the edge of Barrio Viejo, Armory Park and a gateway to Tucson’s south side,” Haskins said. “It is a nice little corner that I expect will be a hub for community activity.”

In other breakfast news....

The folks at the newly opened Prep & Pastry restaurant in central Tucson aren’t satisfied with cracking a few eggs and serving it alongside toast and home fries.

These guys like their first meal of the day to be so memorable you’ll be reminiscing about it when you sit down to the last meal of the day.

There’s a tri-tip and scrambled eggs sandwich served on a house made Cheddar biscuit slicked with jalapeño jam and topped with arugala. Their version of the Mexican scramble is the A.M. Relleno — a roasted poblano pepper stuffed with scrambled eggs, queso fresco, pico and Native Seeds/Search mole.

They are just getting started, said Nathan Ares, who owns the restaurant with his partners William Meinke, Billy Kovacks and Brian Pracko. The foursome opened Prep & Pastry, 3073 N. Campbell Ave., last Tuesday. The spot was most recently home to Amelia Grey’s Cafe & Catering.

Prep & Pastry, which serves breakfast and lunch, raises the bar on breakfast fare. This is a scratch kitchen, helmed by Jessie Bright (formerly of So-Ho and PY Steakhouse), where the bread used in the French toast is made on premises and they get as much of their food as possible from local farmers.

“We’re trying to be as local friendly as possible.,” Ares said. “We started at a bad time, in the middle of the winter of Arizona.”

Prices average $6 to $8; the most expensive breakfast is a duck confit hash for $11.

In about a month, Ares said, Prep & Pastry will resume the high teas that were popular at Amelia Grey’s. But Prep & Pastry will offer a modernized version, with the sandwich and pastry tier stands made of mesquite instead of metal and tea served from a french press, not a teapot.

Among the pastries you’ll find are scones that Ares said “are to die for.”

“We actually steeped our Lady Earl Grey tea into our scone dough for the blueberry scones,” he explained. “We’ll infuse tropical sunshine tea into the fresh strawberry scones. It gives it an extra burst of flavor.”

Prep & Pastry is open from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. daily; facebook.com/prepandpastry

The week-old Bodega Kitchen & Wine is popping the champagne corks and celebrating its grand opening Thursday and Friday.

Come in for lunch or dinner on Thursday or Friday and a glass of champagne is on the house.

Bodega, 4340 N. Campbell Ave. in St.Philip's Plaza, specializes in small plates including a trio of empanadas, flat bread, pork ribs, risotto cakes and a shrimp on a bed of polenta. Prices run $7 to $11 and owner Alek Comyford said two make a meal.

The menu also includes salads and soups, cheese boards and five entrees ($12 to $22) including seafood pasta, a brick-grilled chicken and the Bodega Cheddar burger. 

Bodega serves lunch from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. daily and dinner daily beginning at 5 p.m. Between 3 and 5 p.m., the restaurant has an any-time menu that borrows from lunch and dinner.

Bodega replaced Comyford's Liv Cafe + Bistro, which closed last fall.

Brian Metzger is closing his 5½-year-old, financially troubled Jax Kitchen on the northwest side and opening a new restaurant in the Foothills.

On Feb. 21 — Metzger’s birthday and the day his second wife is due with the couple’s first child — he will open Poppy Kitchen in the space that used to house Janos Wilder’s J Bar at La Paloma Resort & Spa, 3770 E. Sunrise Drive.

The 3,000-square-foot space has been vacant since Wilder closed J Bar and its more upscale sibling, Janos, next door in May 2012.

The last day for Jax — Metzger’s first restaurant — will be Feb. 16. He said he had already decided that he would close the restaurant at 7826 N. Oracle Road, at West Ina Road, when his lease is up in June.

“I wish we had made it to the end of June, but unfortunately I couldn’t make it at that corner,” Metzger said.

Metzger Family Restaurants also owns The Abbey, 6960 E. Sunrise Drive, which has been open three years; and Gio Taco, which opened last fall at 350 E. Congress St., at the Cadence student housing complex downtown.

Poppy Kitchen will borrow dishes and influences from Metzger’s other restaurants, including Jax’s goat-cheese appetizer, steak tartare and cast-iron ribeye steak. Longtime corporate chef Virginia “Ginny” Wooters is curating the menu, Metzger said.

Poppy Kitchen’s announcement comes two weeks after Jax completed its Chapter 11 bankruptcy reorganization, which Metzger filed in early August to give himself breathing room from investors. Creditors accepted the plan, and a bankruptcy judge confirmed the plan on Jan. 3, said his lawyer, Scott Gibson.

According to U.S. Bankruptcy Court records, Metzger owed the Internal Revenue Service $160,000 and the state Department of Revenue $6,700. At the time, he also owed investors and lenders $185,000, according to court documents, and vendors $60,000.

Metzger said three-quarters of his initial Jax investors have moved with him to Gio Taco and Poppy Kitchen. In an email he sent to customers late Tuesday, he said he is looking for more.

“The company is growing, so I always say it’s good to know who’s out there,” Metzger said.

Metzger had been talking with La Paloma officials since last June as the restaurant and resort were one year into a two-year, $35 million improvement project.

La Paloma General Manager Glenn Sampert was not available to comment on Wednesday, but in a written statement he said Poppy Kitchen fits nicely with the resort’s nearly finished redevelopment.

“We took the time necessary to find the right organization to partner with, and Metzger Family Restaurants has been creating extraordinary dining experiences here in our community for many years,” Sampert said.

Poppy is named after Metzger’s grandfather.

Prep & Pastry, a breakfast and lunch restaurant, has taken up residence in the former home of  Amelia Grey's Cafe & Catering at 3073 N. Campbell Ave. 

The restaurant, which opened Tuesday, is owned by Nathan Ares , who owns the restaurant with his partners William Meinke, Billy Kovacks and Brian Pracko.  

Prep & Pastry aims to raise the bar on breakfast fare. Highlights from the scratch kitchen, helmed by Jessie Bright (formerly of So-Ho and PY Steakhouse), include a tri-tip and scrambled eggs sandwich served on a house made Cheddar biscuit slicked with jalapeño jam and topped with arugala. Their version of the Mexican scramble is the A.M. Relleno — a roasted pablano pepper stuffed with scrambled eggs, queso fresco, pico and Native Seeds/Search mole. 

Prices average $6 to $8; the most expensive breakfast is a duck confit hash for $11.

Prep & Pastry is open from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. daily.

The former Dove Mountain Grill in Marana is now a back-to-basics Mexican restaurant.

The owners opened Lo Esencial (Basics) just before Christmas at 12130 N. Dove Mountain Blvd.

The restaurant features small plates of traditional Mexican cuisine including soft tacos, burritos and tortas. Speciality items include fish tacos, carne asada and pork slow-roasted in Coca-Cola.

Prices run from $4 to $12; a giant burrito funs $20 and manager Chris Leonard of Nonie Restaurant fame said it's the "biggest thing you've ever seen in your life, as far as food goes."

"I've never seen one person eat it," he said. "I've seen two people split it or one person eat half and take it home. It was kind of like a joke at first but people are loving it."

Dove Mountain Grill, which was started by the folks behind the foothills restaurant Vintabla, closed in late August after nearly five years in business.

Lo Esencial is open from 3 to 9 Tuesdays through Sundays; closed Mondays. Details: Call 579-8999.

See more restaurant news in Thursday's Caliente.

Daniel Scordato will move his popular Italian restaurant, Vivace, from St. Philip’s Plaza to the old Foothills home of Anthony’s in the Catalinas.

Scordato hopes to open Vivace in its new digs in mid-March. He will close the St. Philip’s location two weeks before that. No firm date has been set, he said.

“I love the location. I like this place (St. Philip’s); it’s been very good for me. But I saw the potential of having a free-standing building that overlooks the town. It was too good a deal to pass up,” Scordato said late last week.

The move will increase Vivace’s capacity by 48 seats with the addition of a sizable banquet room, but the dining room will seat roughly the same number as Vivace in St. Philip’s, 4310 N. Campbell Ave.

Scordato has spent the past three months renovating the 9,000-square-foot space at 6440 N. Campbell Ave. Most of the $400,000 project has been cosmetic, including replacing flooring and painting. He also moved the bar from the center of the restaurant to the side and replaced electrical wiring and plumbing.

Scordato opened Vivace at Grant and Swan roads in 1993 and moved it to St. Philip’s Plaza eight years later. In 2009, he spun off a pizza restaurant, Scordato Pizzeria, also in St. Philip’s; he is selling that restaurant to his nephew Justin Fitzsimmons, who has helped run it since it opened.

Anthony’s in the Catalinas was a destination fine-dining Italian restaurant for 25 years when owner Anthony Martino closed it on Sept. 3.

Chicago-based Potbelly Sandwich Shop is set to open three Tucson restaurants between May and July.

Company officials said they plan to open their first location on East Broadway and North Craycroft Road in May. Another restaurant is expected to open in June at North Oracle and West Roger roads and the third will open in the University of Arizona area in July.

A company spokesman said she didn't have the exact addresses.

Potbelly Sandwich Shop was born in Chicago in 1977. Today, it has more than 300 locations in 18 states and Washington, D.C.

Read more restaurant news in Thursday's Caliente.

In the span of the last year, Adrian Romero went from construction worker to food truck operator to brick-and-mortar restaurateur, specializing in the Agua Prieta-style Mexican cuisine he grew up on in Douglas.

On Dec. 13, Romero, who has lived in Tucson 13 years, opened Olé Rico Mexican Steakhouse in the old Mr. K’s BBQ space at 1830 S. Park Ave. The restaurant serves a streamlined menu of burritos, Mexican sandwiches and quesadillas, ranging in price from $2.50 to $4.50. The most expensive item on the menu is the $12 grilled-steak plate served with tortillas.

Romero said he has been cooking all his life, but he made his living doing construction with an uncle in Tucson.

Last spring, he rolled out his Olé Rico food truck, which looks like a little cabin on wheels. He cooked steaks and burgers on an outdoor grill fueled by mesquite wood. He parked mostly on Tucson’s southwest side near South Valencia Road and South Westover Avenue, and took the truck out on weekends to a few community events including Cyclovia and Second Saturdays Downtown.

Business was good, but the southwest-side neighborhood wasn’t the safest.

“It was kind of dangerous where I was at,” Romero said. “Where I was at in Pima County, it was hard to find a spot.”

Romero said he decided to make the leap to permanent restaurant after talking to the building’s owner, Charles Kendrick. Kendrick, the namesake for Mr. K’s BBQ, runs his Afro-American Heritage Museum in half of the building and has had a restaurant in the other half since the late 1990s.

“I think it was the only possible setup for me to work the menu because he has the outside grills,” Romero said.

Romero said he started working on cleaning up and painting the space in November. It had been vacant for months, since a short-lived Caribbean restaurant closed last summer. Mr. K’s, which Kendrick’s son, Ray, ran for more than a decade, moved farther south to 6302 S. Park Ave. in the summer of 2012.

Olé Rico has an Old West feel to it, with small saddles serving as kids’ booster seats, a patch of barbed wire from Southern Arizona’s ranching history displayed on one wall and mining tools prominently displayed on another. Miniature versions of old movie posters, many of them filmed in the Tucson area, hang in the dining room.

Romero said once he settles into the restaurant, he’ll bring the food truck to special community events.

“I want to do a lot of public events with it,” he said. “It’s really neat. It’s looks like a cabin.”