Brotzeit Lokal
Chop Bar’s Lev Delany is among the backers of Brotzeit, German for “snack,” which will sit on the waterfront at 1000 Embarcadero at 10th Avenue. An adjacent marina will allow boats to dock right there, including a forty-foot delta cruiser owned by Delany’s partners and available for bay tours. Simple and traditional German fare — house-made spaetzels, sauerkraut, and seasonal pickles — will pair with twelve drafts and a large selection of bottles steered toward Bavarian-style medium-bodied lagers (think more malt than hops). Highlights will include a house Linden Street Bavarian, mini-kegs tapped tableside, and afternoon barbecues on the estuary-view patio. Tentative opening date is April 21.
Linden Street Beer Garden
While the 19th-century brick brewery adds tanks to a second high-ceilinged brew room that will expand production significantly, Adam Lamoreaux is planning an accompanying overhaul of the tasting room and build-out of the adjacent room and patios into a restaurant, meaning retail sales will also arc upward. Lamoreaux is in talks with James Syhabout of Commis to introduce a concept similar to Bar Tartine in the beautiful brick-and-pine-floor space, where rotating chefs will give the menu a completely new feel every few years. The tasting room will spill onto the generous decks in front and borrow low-labor-involved foods from the restaurant. Lamoreaux hopes to have permits approved by January.
Lungomare
The restaurant, which means “seafront” in Italian, is fitting for the spacious waterside spot currently occupied by Miss Pearl’s Restaurant and Lounge in Jack London Square. A project of Chop Bar’s Chris Pastena and Grand Tavern’s Temoor Noor (under the restaurant group 5 Terraces), Lungomare will seize upon the setting with better-optimized patios (wind breaks and heaters can go a long way). Executive Chef Craig DiFonzo’s menu, meanwhile, will draw its inspiration from the coastal Liguria region of Italy using local ingredients. Napoleon-style pizzas, smoked meats, seafood stews, and pasta made in a special room on the premises will be flanked by Italian wines and California-grown Italian varietals curated by Saeed Amini. The terms of the lease dictate doors must swing open for dinner February 7.
Tribune Tavern
Downtown gets its long overdue meeting place, built around a welcoming U-shaped bar, sliding windows that open onto the sidewalk, and casual fare like shepherd’s pies, a robust burger, Reuben sandwiches, and big salads given a twist by way of kitchen creativity and inventive sourcing. Another Pastena/Noor/5 Terraces project, it’s being envisioned as a place where business meetings happen at lunch and after-work cocktails are sipped at happy hour, but also where Oakland’s diversity congregates. Construction is well underway, with about a four-month timeline until the taps flow.
TBA at “The Hive”
If all goes according to plan, 5 Terraces will give the Uptown a tequila-mezcal bar at the greatly anticipated, albeit officially unnamed, development at 22nd Street and Broadway. Some two hundred tequilas and fifty mezcals will be offered, plus breakfast, lunch, and dinner options that will lean toward the Yucatán. There’s also a profoundly open layout design in the works, and hopes for a wood-fired oven. “It should be fun,” Pastena said. “We get to lay it out however we want.” While this project remains in the purely planning stage, Pastena signed the lease last week.
