A woman sits on her porch, squinting into the sun. Across the street, workers in masks use loud machines to move mountains of recycling—soda cans, yogurt cups, bottles of wine. The air smells slightly fermented. It’s not offensive in the guttural way garbage is; just humid and biological, the unsexy part of a city’s environmental efforts. Two blocks south, giant cranes lower their necks, plucking shipping containers like food from a trough and loading them onto semitrucks, which will gargle diesel as they haul away through Barrio Logan. This neighborhood has one of the highest asthma rates in California.
In other words, it’s a logical place for CloudKitchens—a future-of-food concept whose inaugural location was built across from a Los Angeles cemetery. Nondisclosure agreements prevent anyone associated with CloudKitchens from saying so, but the DBA (“doing business as”) in the paperwork makes it clear: “Barrio Food Hub” is their regional alias.
At Willie Wingz, “Willie P” Stewart and his family sold out on their first day operating at the Hub. Photo Credit: Valerie Durham
CloudKitchens’ idea is to round up the country’s ghost kitchens. On third-party delivery apps, ghost kitchens look and read like traditional restaurants. They’ve got a name, a logo, a menu. But at the physical address, there are no chairs or tables, no dining room, no humans except the kitchen staff. Ghost kitchens are, essentially, restaurants whose front-of-house positions have shuffled off this mortal coil.
Opened in February, Barrio Food Hub’s 10,000-square-foot warehouse is lined with 25 cooking cubicles, each about 200 square feet. The warehouse resembles a self-storage facility where the door to each unit is open and, instead of Grandma’s furniture and sad-clown art, there are stoves and fryers. Some call the model “WeWork for restaurants.”
Photo Credit: Valerie Durham
For now, BFH is home to mostly small operators. Willie Wingz is an Asian-style chicken concept started by local cook and rapper “Willie P” Stewart with his uncle and grandmother (her recipe is the star). Spring Valley’s Cali Comfort BBQ has an outpost here, using BFH to expand distribution of their barbecue to downtown San Diego, which would’ve been logistically impractical from their East County location. There’s a popular vegan startup, Cultivated Greens. A former chef for the San Francisco 49ers is R&D’ing a Hawaiian-food spot called Big Kahuna Grill. All of them cater almost exclusively to the booming third-party delivery market dominated by Uber Eats, Grubhub, Postmates, and DoorDash.
Even the flip-phone people know what DoorDash is by now. The pandemic made sure of it. Quarantined, hungry, and personally offended by the dishwashing requirements of self-sustenance, Americans more than doubled their spending on food delivery apps in 2020 ($2.5 billion to $5.5 billion, according to MarketWatch). Enough for some of the world’s largest companies to place their bets that our food spending habits have permanently changed. Last year, Amazon invested $575 million for a 16 percent stake in Deliveroo, a ghost kitchen hub in the UK. In the US there’s Kitchen United, backed by Google’s venture branch, GV. And Barrio Food Hub—aka CloudKitchens—is backed by Travis Kalanick, former CEO of Uber.
According to the LA Times, the framework for CloudKitchens dates back to 2015, when tech entrepreneur and USC professor Diego Berdakin, under the name City Storage Systems, purchased unwanted, inexpensive commercial real estate (old parking lots, warehouses across from cemeteries) and turned them into affordable HQs for online businesses. Berdakin spent two years installing 27 ghost kitchens into a single LA warehouse and called it CloudKitchens. Berdakin sold controlling interest in City Storage Systems for $150 million to Kalanick, who’d overseen the rollout of Uber Eats four years earlier. According to a report by the Wall Street Journal, by last October Kalanick had spent more than $130 million on 40 commercial properties across the US—including this one.
Photo Credit: Valerie Durham
Some call it a land grab by technocrats (virtual businesses don’t need sexy footprints, so acquisitions are cheap). Some call it a data grab by technocrats (CloudKitchens collects data from tenants and uses it to launch concepts of its own). Some call it the future and the low-key savior of restaurants, providing an optimized revenue stream for an industry whose existing streams are more like trickles over dust.
Proponents of ghost kitchens say the lower cost allows entrepreneurs a more affordable entry point to the increasingly cost-dumb world of restaurants. Danny Fitzgerald, principal of San Diego–based real estate developer Endeavor, estimates that opening a modest local restaurant (1,000–1,500 square feet, turnkey, spending just the basics on new decor) requires about $300,000 to $400,000 and a 5-to-10-year lease commitment. By comparison, CloudKitchens requires only a 6-to-12-month lease, with rent somewhere around $4,000 a month (though it varies based on the size and location of the rented kitchen).
“As a full-service restaurant in Spring Valley, we’re profitable—doing $3.3 million before the pandemic,” says Shawn Walchef, owner of Cali Comfort BBQ. “But we only had a net-net of six percent. That’s not a great pitch to investors, especially when we’d have to raise another $1.5 million to open a new location. So how do we expand? We weren’t actively pursuing it until we started understanding digital hospitality. The model works. For less than $100,000, we can go to a new market.”
Photo Credit: Valerie Durham
On the Rise
Willie P and his grandma started Willie Wingz in her kitchen in 2019. They’d take preorders and distribute on Sundays. He would bring trays of chicken downtown and serve them, pop-up style, in parking lots outside nightclubs. When a residency at Phantom Club kicked the business into gear, the family’s next logical step was a commercial space.
“We ran our numbers,” explains Willie P’s uncle, James Clark Jr. “A brick-and-mortar was way too much for us. So we decided to do a food truck. We had a business plan ready— and then this came along.”
The ghost kitchen market is not small. In August 2020, Research and Markets estimated that the industry will grow to $71.4 billion by 2027 (it generated $43.1 billion in 2019). According to Restaurant Business, 63 percent of consumers, and 73 percent in the 18–34 age range, said they were likely to order from a restaurant that had no storefront. Restaurant Business also reported that before the pandemic, only 15 percent of restaurants claimed to use ghost kitchens. During? 51 percent.
Even the biggest restaurant chains have entered the game. On Postmates, It’s Just Wings sounds like a real place where sports people spend afternoons sipping beers over bones. But in reality, It’s Just Wings is just Chili’s. The national chain owns the ghost kitchen. Applebee’s has a ghost brand called Neighborhood Wings. Pasqually’s Pizza? Chuck E. Cheese.
Barbecue drizzled on a sandwich from Cali Comfort BBQ Photo Credit: Valerie Durham
It smacks a little of catfishing—that phenomenon when people present a dreamy fiction of themselves online (Alessandro, rock-climbing architect, enjoys capoeira) and then show up as their very different real selves (Jerry, water-bottle flipper, enjoys Fortnite). Some brands are more transparent about their app-based counterparts than others. Regardless, last August the parent company of Chili’s told CNBC it expected It’s Just Wings to generate $150 million in its first year.
The question is: What happens to the delivery market when the pandemic is over? We all seem desperate to eat and drink in loud, crowded rooms with other humans again. Surely, fewer of us will enjoy restaurant meals à la couch, and demand will dip. But how far?
Willie P and Clark are aware of the impending market correction. But right now they’re willing to play with the numbers in front of them. They sold out their first day at the Hub, and were turning a profit within the first two weeks. Part of their success is due to their social media savvy. They use Willie P’s music to drive attention to the brand. Talking to them in the BFH parking lot, both are covered head-to-toe in Willie Wingz gear. To make it in Cloud- Kitchens, most say, requires digital branding and good old-fashioned hustle (one of the Hub’s tenants, an unrelated sushi concept, already left due to slow sales).
Clark says they’re working 13 to 18 hours a day. His feet are numb. But they’re planning to sign up for CloudKitchens’ next location, slated for the SDSU area.
Photo Credit: Valerie Durham
Walchef is so sold on ghost kitchens that he plans to convert part of Cali Comfort’s original restaurant to the model. “I don’t see the third-party going anywhere,” he says. “We’re projected to do half the volume that we do in Spring Valley, but be three times more profitable. That’s all because of technology. So we went all in on digital. Before the pandemic, we had 64 employees. I can open 10 ghost kitchens, pay those existing employees way more, give them time off.”
There’s no romanticizing work at the Hub. What you can see past the to-go counter (customers can pick up, and many do) looks like a cubicle farm with steam. It has none of that famed restaurant sizzle. But a cook’s life has never been a leisurely one near a picture window.
“Most people who work in the heart of the house aren’t people-people,”Walchef adds.“So this is almost the ideal working environment for some. Ghost kitchens remove a lot of the problems people deal with in hospitality— namely, problem customers.”
Photo Credit: Valerie Durham
The Future of Food
From a community perspective, ghost kitchens like the Hub turn dead commercial spaces into moneymakers. This long-dormant warehouse now contributes to the tax base, gives entrepreneurs a home, and supports jobs. Critics of ghost kitchens point to the fact that the jobs they support (and rely on) are delivery-app drivers—gig workers without health insurance, whose fair treatment became a hot-button issue in the 2020 California election. Prop 22—which exempts app-based transportation and delivery companies from having to classify their drivers as employees—won by a 9 percent margin. But the debate is far from over. Those apps also charge prohibitively high fees (20–30 percent of the total order, wiping out a good chunk of the profit). Finally, ghost kitchens don’t provide employment for hosts, servers, bussers, or bartenders like brick-and- mortar restaurants do.
Few expect ghost kitchens to replace Mister A’s or Morning Glory. But they may replace functional restaurants that don’t offer much in the way of art or music or social experience. It’s simply a new model serving the very different delivery market. And when we order food delivered, who cares if the restaurant has ostrich-feather chairs or an Instagram-bait plant wall, or even “exists”? When the Big Mac arrives, we only care that it’s relatively warm, there’s no bite out of it, and it tastes like a Big Mac. So why would a restaurateur— already operating in an industry with notoriously small margins, staring down incremental raises to the minimum wage—pay for chairs, tables, art, Muzak, or even employees?
“There’s a lot of pushback, sure,” says Walchef. “But we can’t discriminate in how people get our food.”
Possibly the most salient criticism of ghost kitchens—the one that seems to have real potential to bring down this burgeoning industry— is the traffic. Hundreds of delivery drivers (and some to-go customers) are constantly coming and going. CloudKitchens is already facing backlash in Chicago, where delivery drivers are reportedly double- parking, acting badly (smoking cigs), and creating traffic issues for residents.
A small seating area outside the Hub Photo Credit: Valerie Durham
There’s currently no traffic impact analysis for Barrio Food Hub (multiple emails to CloudKitchen reps went unanswered), but the general manager of the Chicago location told local news site Book Club that each restaurant had 50–75 orders per hour. Chicago’s a bigger city than San Diego, so it doesn’t directly compare. But even if Barrio Food Hub manages to do half the amount of orders (let’s say 25) at full capacity (25 kitchens), that would be 625 orders every hour. In early March, BFH reportedly had staff on location to handle pickups from 7 a.m. to midnight (17 hours). So over a given day—that’s 10,625 extra cars coming through the neighborhood, past that woman I saw on her porch who was out for some fresh air.
Granted, drivers often pick up multiple orders at a time. But it’s a concern, especially for a community like Barrio Logan, which is already struggling with air pollution due to commercial vehicles and activity. Parking was already an issue in the barrio before CloudKitchens arrived. Workers from the nearby shipyards were using the neighborhood as an employee parking lot. Locals recently convinced the city to make their streets permit-only—which is a win, and potential problem for BFH if its popularity grows.
On a Monday night, I’m able to find parking right in front. I eat a poke bowl from Blue Poke, one of the ghosts, in the front seat of my car. I watch a smattering of delivery drivers pick up food. It’s mellow, orderly. I empathize with most of the drivers as they hesitate, looking a little lost, trying to make heads or tails of this new situation.
Troy Johnson is the magazine’s award-winning food writer and humorist, and a long-standing expert on Food Network. His work has been featured on NatGeo, Travel Channel, NPR, and in Food Matters, a textbook of the best American food writing.
You have to be crazy or a genius to name a restaurant Fish Guts. You have to be even crazier to open a restaurant that holds maybe two dozen people at a time—if you don’t mind elbowing one other while scarfing down some of the best fish tacos in San Diego.
And yes, “best” is a relative term. But in Fish Guts’ case, it’s for real—and that’s saying something in a town literally world-famous for fish tacos.
Ever since Pablo Becker opened up his diminutive eatery in 2023 at the corner of Logan Avenue and Sampson Street in Barrio Logan, Fish Guts has been named one of the city’s best new restaurants in 2023, Critic’s Pick for the best fish tacos in San Diego in 2024, 2025 and 2026, as well as readers’ top pick in 2024. It’s like if Rubio’s married into the royal family.
Most of his ingredients come straight from the cold waters of the Pacific Ocean, which happens to be down the street. His de espada (blackened swordfish) taco is the stuff of legend. He’s kept Fish Guts operating at an elite level, which tends to happen when you work for five years in Chicago under chef Richard Sandoval (who, by chance, is also his cousin) and open an ahead-of-its-time high-end modern Mexican restaurant in East Village (El Vitral Restaurant & Tequileria, 2009-2013).
Now Becker is branching out again, opening two new concepts in Barrio Logan this fall.
The first will be upstairs from Fish Guts, which at one point was destined to become an intimate omakase counter. Santo Poco will be a lunch-only sandwich shop, offering takeout and delivery (no dine-in), and the sandwiches will be a little Mexican, a little French, a little Italian, a little from Chicago, a little from New York. Basically, a bunch of different styles all on really, really good bread.
“There’s probably going to be a Cuban-style sandwich in there with a touch of Mexican, some cold cut Italians, too, putting my touch on them,” he says. “That’s what I feel like is my style of cooking.”
Things will be traditional, but inventive. Like his fish & chips taco at Fish Guts: two classic dishes, one killer mash-up. There will also be a hat tip to the late, great Anthony Bourdain, a sandwich called the Antonio Bourdain.
The second will be across the street from Fish Guts in the former Lia’s Lumpia space. Concrete Cowboy will be a taco-driven joint on the same wavelength as Fish Guts (keep it simple, keep it special), but featuring land animals rather than sea brethren. Think tacos made with duck confit, ribeye, pork belly, skirt steak.
The inspiration behind Concrete Cowboy comes from Becker’s father, a lifelong Western obsessive, despite growing up in Mexico City’s urban metropolis. “He always liked that cowboy life, that vibe,” he says. “I always say ‘Dad, you just grew up in the wrong city.”
He’s aiming to open Santo Poco in October and Concrete Cowboy in November. Neither require massive renovations, and while the former Lia’s Lumpia space will keep the cabin-esque aesthetic, he’s creating more of an adobe-style exterior and an interior lined with Western-themed wallpaper and taxidermied animals. He’ll also tweak the bar layout to move from a fast-casual feel to full service.
Local designer Dane Danner is designing both spaces and visual direction for menu layouts, logos, and packaging, going for low-key, but high on vibes. Once Concrete Cowboy opens, Fish Guts will temporarily close to remodel the space to switch its white palette for a warmer feel, plus introducing a refreshed menu featuring some new tacos and other items.
Could another Fish Guts be on the way somewhere else in San Diego? Not likely, says Becker. “Fish Guts is cool, “ he says. “I feel once you start branching out, it’s more forced, not as organic.” So for now, count on Becker staying in the neighborhood.
Santo Poco opens for lunch daily October 2026, 2222 Logan Avenue (above Fish Guts). Concrete Cowboy opens Tuesday through Sunday for lunch and dinner November 2026, 2219 Logan Avenue.
Beth Demmon is an award-winning writer and podcaster whose work regularly appears in national outlets and San Diego Magazine. Her first book, The Beer Lover's Guide to Cider, is now available. Find out more on bethdemmon.com.
Ten years ago, restaurant design centered around sleek minimalism. Fonts lacked serifs, clean lines dominated, and any manufacturer that made globe-shaped chandeliers must have made an absolute killing.
Things have changed since then, and Jeff Fink says it’s time for Madison on Park to glow up. On September 7, Madison will temporarily close its doors for a top-to-bottom renovation of the space and concept. Fink hopes to reopen this fall ahead of the busy holiday season, with a new look he calls moody mid-century maximalism.
“We have to take into consideration what’s going on culturally,” he says. When Madison first opened, TikTok wasn’t a thing in the U.S. and craft cocktails felt relatively cutting-edge. Today, he sees a resurgence in the vintage look, handmade goods, and low-to-no ABV drinks dominating menus everywhere.
Courtesy of Madison on Park | Photo Credit: Andy McRory
Fink and his partner Matt Sieve have already dabbled with that sort of motif at Sonny’s Pizza, their Brooklyn-inspired joint around the corner. Fully half of the cocktail menu is made up of spritzes, mocktails, and Negronis. Madison 2.0 will take it further.
The new concept doesn’t have a name yet—Fink says they have to feel out the vibes as they make progress with the design. “The name comes when you see it appear,” he says. But he has a few design elements in mind: things like more artwork and more uplighting. “Not cluttered and overstuffed… I want to keep it intimate, sexy, and immersive.”
Madison rightly earned its rep as one of the best-dressed eateries in San Diego, nabbing an Orchid Award for interior design its first year. The returning designers Anna and David Sindelar originally transformed the space from weird padded walls and fake greenery at Lei Lounge into a mid-century modern wonderland, complete with a signature arched ceiling and geometric patterns aplenty. Michelin-recognized chef Mario Cassineri (Ciccia Osteria, Bice Ristorante) built a menu heavy on Mediterranean flavors mixed with California classics.
The new menu shouldn’t feel completely jarring, but will take cues from Fink’s recent travels in Spain with his family. Expect shareable plates with lighter ingredients. “Americans eat way too much, and our portions are way too big,” he says. “I like the idea of smaller plates, healthier plates, and being creative… I’d rather see 15 items on the menu that are all less than $20 so that I can try different ones.” Bar manager Danny Kuehner will continue developing craft cocktails and mocktails for the new venture, as well as curating a selection of wine from Europe and locally.
Courtesy of Madison on Park | Photo Credit: Haley Hill
This isn’t the only project on their plate. Besides running Sonny’s in University Heights and Madi in Normal Heights, later this fall, Fink and Sieve will also open Josie’s, a modern all-day, Midwestern-style diner inspired by Sieve’s Minnesota roots. Like all their restaurants, it’ll hold a special part of their families’ legacies—something Fink hopes people feel as soon as they enter.
“You walk into Sonny’s, you’re like ‘Oh, Jeff’s at home,’” Fink laughs. “[Josies’] will be ‘Matt’s at home.’” The next version of Madison? We’ll have to wait and see.
Madison on Park will temporarily close on September 7 until October (barring any unexpected delays). Keep up with the newest updates on Madison’s Instagram.
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Have breaking news, exciting scoops, or great stories about new San Diego restaurants or the city’s food scene? Send your pitches to [email protected].
Beth Demmon is an award-winning writer and podcaster whose work regularly appears in national outlets and San Diego Magazine. Her first book, The Beer Lover's Guide to Cider, is now available. Find out more on bethdemmon.com.
When I was pregnant, my food craving was singular and intense. If I didn’t eat at least one thing doused in cinnamon every day (ideally, more than one), I was—to put it gently—a complete monster.
Since then, my obsession has tempered somewhat. But cinnamon buns still perch high on my top treats list, so I’m always on the lookout for the next great place to indulge. IMO, The Huddle in Mission Hills’ mondo cinnamon roll remains top-tier, but after eyeing the ooey, gooey goodies from Sinner Buns, we might have a contender.
Originally from Ukraine, Daria Nadar had already done everything one can do at a bakery—business operations, wholesale contracts, actually baking, you name it—so during the pandemic, she started dabbling with perfecting her cinnamon rolls. After she got a couple fans over social media, she threw her first pop-up to see how they’d be received. She sold out.
After a few false starts with a couple storefronts and business deals, Nadar officially launched Sinner Buns in October 2025 with her partner Filipe Pazi. After making it through an unexpectedly hectic season stuffed with holiday orders, the team closed temporarily to get everything in line and reopened this April. Business has remained in full swing ever since.
There are only so many ingredients in a cinnamon roll, but “the process is what makes it special,” she says, adding they use fresh yeast rather than powder and a 48-hour process for each batch of brioche dough made to order. (Thus the need for pre-orders.) Customers can preorder until Thursday each week for pickup Friday, Saturday, or Sunday from Sinner Buns’ ghost kitchen at 780 Hollister Street, just east of Imperial Beach.
You can also catch her at various pop-ups around San Diego. Eventually, Nadar opens to offer nationwide shipping (once she figures out the logistics and quality control) and one day, her own storefront.
But it’ll be on her terms, not the whims of social media. “We already learned how to not only rely on virality of the product, because you go viral and then it fades,” she says. “It’s a slow burner, and I know eventually, it’s going to grow much more.”
Courtesy of San Diego Spirits Festival
San Diego Restaurant News & Food Events
Beth’s Bites
Get spirited away at the 17th annual San Diego Spirits Festival. If you understood that reference, I regret to inform you that it is not a Studio Ghibli watchathon, but it’s still a win with a bonanza of craft makers pouring libations at the Museum of Contemporary Art in La Jolla for two full days. On September 26-27, try sips, glugs, and guzzles from brands like Condesa Gin and Uncle Nearest (with some bites to wash it all down, of course). Could you ask for a more picturesque venue? Spoiler alert: no.
You love to see a longtime employee take the reins of a beloved local institution. That’s exactly what happened at Konito’s Cafe in Pacific Beach, which is currently transitioning to Pablo’s Cafe, which is now under new ownership. (Yes, his name is Pablo.) Will their breakfast sandwich still slap? Guess we’ll have to go find out.
I’ve yet to visit Tigawok, the small California-based chain serving mini bowls like Kung Pao chicken and Mapo tofu. But the latest storefront (and the first in San Diego) is now soft open in La Jolla, and it’s only a matter of time before their Sichuan shredded chicken gets in my belly.
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Beth Demmon is an award-winning writer and podcaster whose work regularly appears in national outlets and San Diego Magazine. Her first book, The Beer Lover's Guide to Cider, is now available. Find out more on bethdemmon.com.
A perfectly designed home rarely happens by accident. Those kitchens that feel effortless and rooms that seem to tell a story the second you walk in? They’re usually the work of someone who knows exactly what they’re doing.
It’s knowing which ideas will actually work, which materials will hold up over time, and how to turn a collection of choices into a space that feels intentional. That’s where a professional interior designer comes in.
For the American Society of Interior Designers (ASID) California San Diego Chapter, the goal is to help people see interior design as more than just the finished look. Behind every well-designed space is a process built on technical expertise. Designers are educated in everything from professional software and construction details to building codes, space planning, materials, and functionality.
Courtesy of ASID
“People don’t always realize how much goes on behind the scenes,” Kirsten Recce , current president of the ASID California San Diego Chapter, says. “Our designers are not just doing furniture placement and color selection and picking out new fluffy pillows. That’s not what they’re trained for.”
ASID members bring formal education, continued learning, and industry knowledge to their projects, helping create spaces that are not only beautiful, but designed to work. A paint color that changes completely depending on the lighting. A material that looks beautiful in a showroom but doesn’t make sense for everyday life. A layout that photographs well but doesn’t function for the people living there. These are the details where professional guidance can make all the difference.
Still, one of the biggest misconceptions about hiring an interior designer is that it’s reserved for massive renovations, luxury homes, or people who already know exactly what they want. The process can feel intimidating. Where do you begin? Is a designer worth the investment? What if you only need help with one room?
ASID’s answer: start with one hour.
ASID’s Spruce Up events break down one of the biggest barriers between homeowners and professional design: knowing where to begin. Held twice a year, the community program gives homeowners the chance to work directly with an ASID designer through a one-hour, $125 consultation in their own home. Whether you’re looking for advice on furniture placement, window treatments, kitchen and bath updates, remodeling ideas, vacation rentals, color selections or something else entirely, the upcoming September 2026 event offers an approachable way to get expert guidance before committing to a full project. Signups are open through Sept. 7, with consultations taking place Sept. 21 through Oct. 31. Proceeds benefit ASID San Diego’s educational and community programs. Register here!
Courtesy of ASID
“It’s a great opportunity for people who are in that exploratory phase,” Recce says. “Maybe they’re not sure they want to hire an interior designer yet, or they think it sounds daunting or expensive. This gives them a chance to discover what working with a designer is actually like.”
Design is personal. A good designer isn’t just creating a beautiful room; they’re helping create a space that fits the way someone lives.
“We’re a resource to all of San Diego County,” Recce says. “It doesn’t cost anything to pick up the phone and call and ask. We’ll answer.”
When San Diego launched Micro Enterprise Home Kitchen Operations (MEHKO), it changed everything. Riverside County first established the experimental program in 2019, with San Diego introducing its own countywide pilot program in 2022 and granting it permanent status in 2024. The new category allowed people to launch at-home retail food operations—basically, home restaurants—with special requirements and restrictions to ensure food safety and smooth operations. Over two dozen counties across California have since adopted their own versions with over 1,200 permits issued, around 100 of them in San Diego alone.
Some have a dizzyingly long waitlist (Warung RieRie), others are still getting their name out there (The Hidden Gazebo Eatery), and still others use MEHKO for pickups rather than fully opening their home as an onsite dining facility. Love Pupusas falls into that category.
Yanira Majano came with her family from El Salvador to the United States when she was 11 years old, bringing a love of cooking and desire to share the country’s cuisine along with her. “There’s a lot of similarity [between Salvadoran food and] Central, South America, even Baja Mexico,” she says. Salvadoran cooking tends to be less spicy than some Mexican cuisines, with an emphasis on ingredients like corn, staples like yucca root (cassava), meats like crispy pork (chicharrón), and sides like curtido, a tangy cabbage slaw that’s typically either naturally fermented or vinegar-based.
And of course, the signature dish of El Salvador—pupusas.
In San Diego, Salvadoran food lacks the widespread availability of other Latin American cuisines like Mexican or Peruvian food, but Majano says she’s seen pupusas gain popularity over the past few years. But she likes to think her recipes, which have been passed down by her mother and kitchen partner Martha, contain a certain special something.
Some pupuserías use rice flour to create the handheld stuffed tortillas, but she prefers the more traditional gluten-free corn flour. Still, it’s what’s inside that really counts. “That’s where we put our own touch,” she explains. Most of Majano’s pupusas come with cheese and different fillings like carnitas, black beans, mushrooms, or zucchini, but she also offers vegan options. Every one comes with a side of curtido and salsa, each made fresh daily.
Showing people the magic of home-cooked food might not have been possible without the MEHKO program or The Cook Alliance, a MEHKO support and advocacy coalition. Opening a brick-and-mortar restaurant requires a huge amount of start-up capital—at least six figures, generally. Not exactly pocket change. “But when the MEHKO program started in 2022, I said, ‘Oh my God, this is for me,’” says Majano.
Now with four years under her belt, she says she’d love to bring Love Pupusas to more food festivals, host more pop-ups, and eventually open a food truck to keep serving the humble dish of her homeland, taking pride in every bite. “[I put] a lot of love in everything I do. You see it when you taste the food,” she promises.
Pre-order Love Pupusas for next day pickup in Rancho Peñasquitos between noon and 5 p.m.
It’s not the end of the road for Catalina Offshore Products—just the end of an address. The local family-owned fish market announced that come September, they are moving from their longtime location in the Morena District to The Old San Diego Seafood Building at 1842 McKinley Avenue in National City. Normal business operations will resume in October with the same retail market fully stocked with premium seafood and local catches, so it’s not goodbye, it’s just “see you later.” (And yes, 5202 Lovelock Street is still open until moving day.)
Don’t come at me with complaints about autumnal seasonal creep—I got an email this week about holiday shopping. In August. In comparison, the 2026 release of Karl Strauss Oktoberfest seems right on time. For the 38th year in a row, ahead of the Munich-inspired festivities, the 5 percent ABV malty amber lager is now available in bottles, with draft coming to the brewpubs in September. Despite the lack of chill in the air, there’s no reason why your fridge can’t be stocked with this frosty German delight.
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Have breaking news, exciting scoops, or great stories about new San Diego restaurants or the city’s food scene? Send your pitches to [email protected].
Beth Demmon is an award-winning writer and podcaster whose work regularly appears in national outlets and San Diego Magazine. Her first book, The Beer Lover's Guide to Cider, is now available. Find out more on bethdemmon.com.
The folks at Kairoa Brewing Company must never be lonely. It seems like there’s always a local pop-up or event at the University Heights space, from Bincho Taco slinging Japanese coal-fired tacos on the rooftop patio every Tuesday to Yipao Coffee serving coffee from a window on the ground floor. Later this year, the New Zealand-inspired brewery will bring yet another resident into the fold—Mon Chourie is launching its first bakery counter service window along Park Blvd.
Mon Chourie owner and baker Kelly Kim first started selling her Korean-style cream puffs at farmers markets and places like Pizza Kaiju, Pho Ga Go, and Mixed Grounds, collaborating with a myriad of other makers (like Amor ice cream and Ming Oun’s) before nabbing a regular spot at Michi Michi Bakery every Wednesday. San Diego Magazine readers even voted Mon Chourie the Best Pop-Up for 2026.
In French, the word for an airy puff pastry is “choux,” which is pronounced generally the same way as “syu,” the Korean word for the same item. (Both sound like “shoe.”) Mon Chourie plays with both iterations with a dash of whimsy by referencing the song My Cherie Amour by Stevie Wonder, which translates to “my darling love.”
As long as all the permits and inspections move forward without issue, Mon Chourie should open in Kairoa before the busy holiday season. She’ll continue appearing every Wednesday at Michi Michi and other pop-ups in the meantime. Once open, expect best-selling flavors like the savory potato croquette (a collaboration with Karanchi chili crisp) and a sweet Dubai chocolate choux au craquelin, a version of puff pastry with a delicate cookie crust.
Classic cream puffs are fluffy, softs and often filled with custard cream in the United States. “What makes a difference for us is we use a very light version of diplomat cream, which is my mom’s recipe,” she explains. Diplomat cream is a lighter French pastry cream that uses whipped cream for a lighter, airier end result.
Choux au craquelin’s signature crunchy top comes from adding a thin disc of cookie-like dough on top of the pastry, which crackles as it bakes, leaving a thin layer of crispiness atop the final product. “It contrasts with the creamy, fluffy cream inside, so it gets that better, deeper texture experience,” she says.
Courtesy of Kelly Kim
Along with her popular cream puffs and her bite-sized “mini-choux” options, Kim is also planning on offering more of a newer-to-her item: salt bread, a rich butter pastry topped with sea salt that originated in Japan, but went completely viral in South Korea. There are a few places to get it in Los Angeles and New York, “but I know that a lot of people here are interested in trying out new stuff, or maybe they had it in Korea or Japan, and they came back, but they couldn’t find it anymore,” says Kim. At first, she didn’t really get why it was so popular. Then she tried it in South Korea earlier this year.
“I was in love,” she laughs. “This is what the hype is about.”
Ideally, Mon Chourie will eventually open its own storefront and introduce more events in North County to satisfy demand. “I would also love to have our own drink program that reflects what’s popular in Korea,” she says. And to mark two years of puffy pastry prosperity, Mon Chourie is throwing a two-year anniversary party at Easy Does It (5375 Kearny Villa Rd., Suite 112) on Tuesday, August 25 from 4 p.m. to 7 p.m. with drink specials like a misugaru latte (a Korean roasted multi-grain powder with espresso), a DJ, photo booths, special ceramic merch created by local ceramicist Whale Tran, and a few other vendors. Get there early.
Mabel’s Gone Fishing has always supported the arts—see their Fishbowl Artist Series—and they’re keeping things going this month with The Studio Table, an immersive dining event on Saturday, August 29 from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. at Barrio Logan-based ceramic studio Tao of Clay. For $160, guests can slurp down oysters and other Spanish-inspired pintxos, Basque ciders, cocktails, and take home a handmade oyster bowl made with reclaimed oyster shells. Gratuity is included for this 21+ event, so be prepared to slow down and enjoy the tangible fruits of nature.
City Tacos keeps moving and shaking, and the restaurant group’s next landing place is Liberty Station. El Punto by City Tacos is slated to open in October in the former El Jardin space (2885 Perry Road, Suite 102). Once destined to become another Lola55 outpost, the space will now become a full-service, family-friendly, and dog-friendly restaurant with seafood, tacos, cocktails, and more.
For as many closings as we’ve seen over the past year, restaurant openings seem to be back on track. The long-awaited Honor Bar finally opened its doors in Del Mar this summer, and Soul Sip in North Park is soft open from 4 p.m. to midnight daily. Still on the way are The Shackhouse by Julian Beer Company (slated to open by Labor Day) and Sprouts Farmers Market plans to open in the former Pancho Villa’s building in North Park this October. (La Mesa is still waiting patiently for Stella Jean’s and Pop Pie to make their debuts.)
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Beth Demmon is an award-winning writer and podcaster whose work regularly appears in national outlets and San Diego Magazine. Her first book, The Beer Lover's Guide to Cider, is now available. Find out more on bethdemmon.com.
Growing up, Laika Nur, MD, Scripps Clinic sports medicine specialist, loved watching beach volleyball when the Association of Volleyball Professionals tour came to her hometown of Chicago. A talented volleyball player herself, she remembers sitting in the stands all day, and once, even got a couple autographs. Years later, Dr. Nur was attending a professional event focused on women’s sports, and the discussion turned to a new professional women’s volleyball league. The general manager and coaching staff for San Diego’s team, the Mojo, happened to be in attendance, and Dr. Nur took the opportunity to ask them if they needed a team doctor. Flash forward to the Mojo’s inaugural 2024 season, when Dr. Nur officially became the team physician. Click here to read more about Dr. Nur and how she incorporates lessons she learned on the court into her practice.
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