Santa Rosa's New Restaurants Moved Into Rooms With a Past, and Kept a Piece of Each One

"We feel so lucky that we got to inherit this iconic spot," Liz Fiedler told Sonoma Magazine the week The Junction opened in the former Villa on Montgomery Drive. "We really didn't realize how much the space means to the community."

Her word, inherit, describes Santa Rosa's whole dining year. This year's best-known openings did not go into new construction. They went into the Villa, Lepe's Taqueria, Cascabel, the old Tipsy Taco and Victory House, rooms that longtime residents can place without an address. Each new owner also carried something forward from the business before. In one case it was the founder himself. In others it was the kitchen staff, a promise to a family, or a menu item regulars refused to give up.

Six Addresses, Six Predecessors

The Owner Who Came Back to His Own Room

Cascabel closed at 909 Village Court, near the back entrance of the Lucky supermarket, on May 23, 2025, The Press Democrat reported. The space sat empty for more than a year. Then the Montgomery Village landlord went to Maher Fakhouri, a restaurateur who had helped launch Cascabel in the same room.

He pitched a Mediterranean restaurant and opened Olives & Agave in early October. The name keeps the old room in it. "Well, we sold a lot of tequila at Cascabel," Fakhouri told Sonoma Magazine when asked about the agave. The full bar is gone, though. The menu now draws on the Levant, meaning Jordan, Palestine, Syria, Israel and Lebanon, along with Mediterranean dishes from Spain to Morocco.

The team has ties nearby as well. General manager Mond Noor also manages Crepevine, Fakhouri's brunch restaurant a few steps away in the same center. Fakhouri's partner, Amal Dahdal, runs the kitchen and approves every plate before it goes out. If you're ordering for the table:

• Fried kibbeh, $17, served the way Dahdal grew up eating it, with tabbouleh and yogurt
• Musakhan rolls, $16, shredded chicken with onion and sumac, crisped in thin flatbread
• Mansaf, $38, braised lamb and rice under a fermented-yogurt sauce, Jordan's national dish
• Kinafeh, $12, a shredded-phyllo pastry with a melted cheese center and rosewater syrup

Olives & Agave lists daily hours of 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. on its website.

The Founder Who Came to Preview Night

The Villa opened above Montgomery Drive in 1976 under Gaspare Bernardo. It closed in August 2022 after 46 years, The Press Democrat reported at the time. The building stood vacant for more than three years. Liz and Dez Fiedler and their partner Jimmy Simpson, who also run a sister Junction in Mill Valley, then spent a year renovating it.

Bernardo sat with his family over pizza at the preview night before the May 11 opening. Fiedler told Sonoma Magazine he was simply happy to see the building come back to life. The interior has been almost entirely reworked, with clean lines, tall open-panel windows and more than 4,000 square feet of outdoor lounge space. Even so, the magazine noted that the original doors were the ones that opened again.

The Junction is a counter-service beer garden that welcomes families and dogs. It serves pizzas, fried cheese curds and Korean fried chicken wings, and the patio looks toward Trione-Annadel State Park. The palm-lined patio has fire pits under oversized umbrellas. Near the entrance, a screen-free arcade has Skee-Ball and shuffleboard. Parking fills the steep driveway at busy hours. There is an overflow lot nearby, and some diners park below and walk up. The Junction's site lists Sunday hours from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. and Saturday hours from 11 a.m. to 10 p.m.

A Promise Made to the Family Down the Road

Farther out Montgomery Drive, at number 4323, Lepe's Taqueria had been, in Sonoma Magazine's words, a Santa Rosa institution for nearly 30 years. Eduardo "Eddie" Lepe ran it for decades, and his children, Bella, Diego and Matteo, kept it going before deciding to close.

The new owners are Hayley Cutri and chef Efrain Balmes, who previously ran Sonoma Eats in Agua Caliente. They made the continuity explicit. "We will continue being a family-run restaurant that warmly and graciously hosts our neighbors," Cutri told the magazine. "We promised that to the family."

Parkside Eats quietly opened in early April. Its menu is California comfort food with Mexican roots, so tacos and quesabirria sit next to burgers, salads and fresh juices. It serves breakfast, lunch, dinner and weekend brunch. Sonoma Magazine's June roundup singled out the birria hash, poke nachos and fish tacos. The owners told the magazine they hike at nearby Annadel and wanted food that is hearty and healthy after a day on the trails.

The Kitchen Crew and the Chicken Tenders

At Epicenter, the 130,000-square-foot sports and entertainment complex, Victory House served pub standards for nearly a decade. In June, Epicenter's owners found pitmaster Bob Costarella through his online reviews and approached him about the restaurant. Within weeks he had taken it over. Costarella had spent a year apprenticing under Lance Kirkpatrick at Stiles Switch BBQ in Austin. He then ran Saturday pop-ups at Sazon Peruvian Cuisine & Deli in Roseland until this spring.

Red Eye Barbecue is how a one-man pop-up became a 250-seat restaurant, and the old room shaped it. Sonoma Magazine reported that Costarella built his team largely from the existing kitchen staff. After steady requests from former customers, he is bringing back Victory House's pretzel bites with cheese and its chicken tenders. He now makes his sauces, sides and desserts from scratch instead of using frozen products.

The beef and pork ribs are smoked over applewood from a Martinelli orchard and vineyard. Beef ribs are $44 a pound, and the beef cheeks at $24 are his alternative to brisket. On Mondays and Tuesdays, the ribs, pork belly, brisket and half chickens are off the menu, while beef cheeks, sausage, turkey and wings stay on. The dining room is loud and full of televisions, and it is built for team dinners and game nights. It opens at 9 a.m. on Sundays.

Two Blocks of Mendocino Avenue Fill Old Gaps

Downtown, the inheritance is looser. Chef Baki Bekci opened Capriciano Osteria at 505 Mendocino Avenue in August, and a week later Sonoma Magazine found it already packed. The room was the Tipsy Taco for eight years and the Acapulco Lounge before that. Bekci grew up in his family's restaurant in Fethiye, on Turkey's Turquoise Coast. He cooked in Four Seasons kitchens in Istanbul, Los Angeles and Calistoga and founded Mezzeluna in Cotati. He has turned the old cantina into a dining room with a fireplace at each end and a patio that Sonoma Magazine called larger than most in the region. His signature dish is the risotto frutti di mare at $34, made with shrimp, lobster and clams, and the ravioli al limone is $28. Capriciano's site lists dinner from 5 p.m. and says the restaurant is closed Tuesdays.

A block away, at 404 Mendocino Avenue, Suite D, Wind McAlister opened the second Sonoma Spice Queen in early September, joining her Petaluma shop. This one fills a category rather than a single room. Sonoma Magazine said it covers the gap left when Penzeys and Savory Spice departed. McAlister grinds, blends and labels by hand, and she stocks more than 50 single spices plus dozens of house blends. Her best seller is a vadouvan French curry built from nearly a dozen ingredients. The shop's site lists hours of 10:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Saturday and 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Sunday.

Where These Rooms Fit Into the Holiday Calendar

The city's own holiday dates line up well with these addresses:

1. Friday, November 27, 4 to 7 p.m. The free Winter Lights tree lighting at Old Courthouse Square has live entertainment, children's activities and Santa photos. Capriciano and Sonoma Spice Queen are both downtown on Mendocino Avenue.
2. December 5 and 6, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. The city's 51st Handmade Holiday Crafts Fair at Finley Community Center has more than 90 local artists. Admission is $5, and children 12 and under get in free.
3. December 12 and 13, 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. The SoCo Market's So Ho Ho Holiday Market moves indoors to the Grace Pavilion at the Sonoma County Fairgrounds, with more than 150 small businesses and free admission. A bag of vadouvan from Sonoma Spice Queen covers any gift-list gaps it leaves.

Check each restaurant's website for holiday hours before you go.

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