••• The agenda for this Tuesday’s County Boards of Supervisors meeting include a lease for the restaurant concession at Goleta Beach, formerly site of Beachside Bar-Cafe. It doesn’t mention the concept(s), but the operator is the Prjkt Restaurant Group. (It’s pronounced like noun “project.”) A Daily Pilot article from last April, founder Alicia Whitley “previously was behind four concessions areas at Bolsa Chica State Beach, including the popular SeaLegs at the Beach” and Prjkt won the concessions to three new restaurants on the state beach in Huntington Beach. The description of those may offer clues to the Goleta plans:
The Huntington Beach House […] is scheduled to open this spring. Sahara’s Sandbar, a pizza place named after Whitney’s 10-year-old daughter Sahara, will open this fall [….] California Fork and Spoon […] is slated to open in early 2022. Additionally, SandBox Beach Rentals […] will offer services like surfboard and firewood vending machines when it opens to the public this May.”
••• The Pali Wine Co.‘s Pali Wine Garden in Oreana’s old Funk Zone space (205 Anacapa) opens this Friday.
••• The Montecito Journal has a long article about the Montecito Country Mart’s decision not to renew the lease of Little Alex’s. I understand people’s sentimental attachment to the restaurant, but it’s not hard to see that the Country Mart needs traffic to support its high-end retail, and Little Alex’s just wasn’t going to do that. Anyway, the mall’s owner, James Rosenfield, confirmed that a “casual, family-friendly Mexican concept” run by a Santa Barbara restaurateur will be taking the space, which certainly sounds like what I had heard—that it’s Corazón Cocina’s Ramon Velazquez.
••• Elsewhere in the Country Mart, in a welcome return to normalcy, Bettina resumes indoor table service on November 1. “Reservations are available now for November and December for both indoor and outdoor dining (our bar is always reserved for walk-ins).”
••• The Saturday farmers’ market has a new vendor, Kelpful. “We’re a small worker owned cooperative run by women with a dream of farming seaweed. Currently, we are sustainably wild harvesting by hand, drying it in the sun, and offering it to people like you.”
••• And, in an effort to make its offerings more clear, Pork Palace has introduced a sub-brand, Santa Barbara Meat Company.
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Do we know who is taking over Santa Barbara Winery’s old spot?
Nope. There’s no liquor-license application for the address yet.
The news about Little Alex’s is depressing. I had hoped to hear it was a retirement, not a forced closure.
Little Alex’s provides great food at a good value. It is a shame that the landlord thinks Montecito wants only a high-end Brentwood style “country mart” for our visitors from LA.
I have to challenge “Country Mart needs traffic to support its high-end retail and Little Alex’s just wasn’t going to do that”. It would be interesting to see just how much traffic Little Alex does generate – resulting in more customers for the entire Mart. There are just too many of us who regularly frequent Little Alex (a destination business in my mind) compared to some of the other merchants in the center. Can’t help but think it goes deeper than this. Many of us are not ok with the decision for what it’s worth. If it was aesthetics, this certainly could have been worked out – wish more of us knew earlier if it could have been fixable. They have a tremendous amount of community support, and many of us would have helped.
I agree. The same people who shop at much of the high-end retail are also many of the people who eat at Little Alex’s. A few weekends ago we got coffee at Cafe Luxxe, picked up an $85 cake at Merci, snagged a $125 birthday present at Mate Gallery for the cake recipient, and then got breakfast burritos to go at Alex’s, where I’ve been eating since I was a little one. This stinks of aesthetic cleansing, and while I also love Corazon, towns filled with chains, even nice local ones, become boring quickly. Try living in London. Every neighborhood has the same 15 local chains on its high street and it’s surprisingly dull once you realize this.
I’m confused…do people actually think Little Alex’s was….good? I’ve eaten there a handful of times and the food was always downright awful. No seasoning, no creativity…and they gave me food poisoning once. Put me on team Corazon!
Hopefully our town won’t end up divided into “teams.” I agree Alex’s isn’t a Michelin Star destination, but they have no trouble doing business so there are many people who like it even if you’re not one. They never missed rent, even during the pandemic. The decision to end their lease seems like an aesthetic one by the business owner. And perhaps also motivated by the profit sharing agreement for tenants at the Country Mart (which works for some, but I also know other local business owners who have been propositioned to join the Mart and declined because of this arrangement). While the private property owner certainly has the right to do whatever he wants, longtime community members don’t have to like it. Some of us think something is lost when the texture of everything is leveled to the same glossy sheen. And FWIW, I got food poisoning at a five star hotel, but I digress.
I’m in complete agreement…..including five star food poisoning!!! Sadly, it happens.