Nibbles & Bytes!

Check Out Al-Sham Palace!

In my Nibbles & Bytes column last issue, I told you about a new Jamaican restaurant with authentic cuisine. This time around, I’m going to let you in on one of New Tampa’s best-kept secrets if you love truly authentic Middle Eastern food.

It’s called Al-Sham Palace, located at 19651 Bruce B. Downs (BBD) Blvd., in the Pebble Creek Collection, the plaza behind Kobe Japanese Steakhouse. Al-Sham Palace, which has been open for around a year or more, is owned and operated by Hadil Simreen, who says that her restaurant’s cuisine features authentic Lebanese, Syrian and Palestinian-style versions of classic Middle Eastern dishes that are usually “Americanized” (my word, not hers) at most other places.

So, whether you like authentically spicy beef or chicken shawarma sandwiches (photo, left) with tahine or tzatziki sauce, or delicious steak kababs with nicely grilled onions, falafel, fried kebbie, hummus or tabouleh, Al-Sham Palace is your place!

And, with the coupon in the ad in our latest New Tampa issue, you can get $5 off any purchase of $30 or more (restrictions do apply)!

 For more info, search “Al-ShamPalace” on Facebook, stop in or call (813) 907-8233 and please tell Hadil that I sent you! 

Las Palmas Goes Back-To-Back!

Even though I personally still prefer their amazing merluza a la Russe (crispy fish with “Russian” sauce) and lechon asado (roasted pork), if you’re looking for the Best Cuban Sandwich in Tampa, it’s hard to argue against the still-new Las Palmas Latin Grill, located next to Five Guys at 6431 E. County Line Rd. (across from LA Fitness and Winn-Dixie).

Co-owner/chef Ramses Garcia and his wife Ana (photo above) were thrilled to have been awarded the title of “World’s Best Historic Cuban Sandwich” — for the second year in a row — at the 8th annual International Cuban Sandwich Festival, again held in historic Ybor City.

In other words, no matter what Cuban fare you prefer, you can’t go wrong at the new Las Palmas Latin Grill!

For more info, stop in or call (813) 803-3903 and please tell Ana and Ramses that I sent you! 

Smallcakes Is Open!

Are you looking for a new and delicious dessert place? Smallcakes has opened in the Shoppes at The Pointe in Tampa Palms. Located at 17010 Palm Pointe Dr., between Ciccio Cali and our friends at the Palms Pharmacy, Smallcakes features 12 signature flavors (photo above) of full-sized cupcakes, special flavors daily, plus homemade ice cream, and the brother-and-sister co-owners Justin and Marissa Dewdney are Freedom High grads. And, although they both live about an hour away, they say they chose the Tampa Palms location because they had sampled Smallcakes in a couple of other places and felt that our area would love it.

Established in Kansas City, MO, in 2008, Smallcakes now has more than 200 stores (many in Texas and Georgia), including the closest ones to us, in Oldsmar and Lakeland.

Marissa and Justin also say that anyone who thinks that “print is dead” doesn’t realize the power of the Neighborhood News, as they have had “dozens of people” telling them that they heard about Smallcakes from my recent small writeups in this column. And, considering that Smallcakes is located in the same area as Ciccio Cali, Koizi, Palm Thai, Stonewood, Olive Garden and Red Lobster, I told the Dewdneys that they should offer a special cupcake deal to anyone who brings in a receipt from any of the aforementioned eateries!

For more info, call (813) 442-4938 or visit SmallcakesCupcakery.com and please bring them those receipts!

Here & There, This & That…

‱ I mentioned last issue that it wasn’t very long ago when there were as many as three frozen yogurt shops in New Tampa alone, but today there is just one, La Berry Yogurt CafĂ©, which we incorrectly reported as closed in our Mar 22 New Tampa issue, although it is has been under new ownership for a little over a month. Please go and try La Berry and tell them that I sent you!

‱ Although I personally enjoyed the German specialties (schnitzel!) at the former Prost Kitchen & Bar in the Palms Connection Plaza at 2802 E. Bearss Ave. (between BBD and Livingston Ave.), the owners of the pub decided to take it in a different direction.

Only open under its new name — Bearss Tavern & Tap (although the outside sign says “Bearss Kitchen & Bar”) — for a week or so at our press time, the redesigned restaurant has retained some of the old menu (including an artisan grilled cheese sandwich, served with tomato bisque), but has added many new items I am excited to try. The one sandwich I did sample when I stopped in — a pesto grilled chicken sandwich (photo above) on crispy sourdough bread — was excellent. I also look forward to trying the chargrilled chicken penne pasta, the artisan pizzas and the flatiron steak frites. Stop in, call (813) 466-5249 or visit BearssTavern.com and tell them I sent you!

‱ Sadly, while I thought that the new Rice n’ Beans was set to open in the former Cody’s Roadhouse space on WC Blvd. shortly after our last issue came out, it still wasn’t open as I went to press with this issue. The Lutz Rice n’ Beans closed two months ago. — GN

School Notes: Turner Bartels Hits Burlington’s Jackpot & Local Students Win Awards!

TBK8 principal Cindy Land

Like most schools, the Turner/Bartels K-8 (TBK8) School hasn’t had enough money available to just give teachers to use in their classrooms.

Until now.

On March 26, the newly opened Burlington store in the Cypress Creek Town Center on the north side of S.R. 56 said hello to the local community it hopes to serve by presenting TBK8 principal Cindy Land with a $10,000 check during a school pep rally as part of the AdoptAClassroom.org program.

AdoptAClassroom.org provides teachers with an online marketplace of nearly 30 school specialty and office supply vendors where they can purchase the materials and tools they need at a discount.

Burlington makes a donation to a local school in each Grand Opening market to celebrate a new store’s location.

“They had one stipulation and that was that the money gets to the kids and the teachers, and it will,” said Land. “There’s not many opportunities for them to have extra cash for their classroom and we want to make this available for everyone.”

Marcus Britt, an ESE Teacher at TBK8 the past five years, said he and most other teachers have had to dip into their own pockets at times to buy the supplies they need.

“Donations, like the one we received today, are incredibly valuable,” he said. “We’re very thankful.”

As for his portion of the $10,000, Britt says he doesn’t know exactly what he’ll buy for his classroom but can’t wait to find out.

“I still need to figure out how I’m going to spend my portion of the funding,” he said. “But no matter what, it will be well spent in a manner that directly affects the student experience.”

Land said it was the biggest donation the school, which opened in 2014, has ever received. Last year, the school received $1,000 from WFLA-TV Channel 8 for being picked as a School of The Week.

Wharton’s Tim Norwood and Rachel Welsh, 3rd place, Structural Design

TECH SAVVY STUDENTS: A number of students from Turner/Bartels K-8 School (TBK8) and Wharton High earned several awards from the Technology Student Association (TSA) statewide competition held in Orlando beginning in late February.

As in past years, the TBK8 team had a strong showing, taking second place in the state in the middle school division. Of the eight entries from Wharton that placed in the top ten in the high school division, one also made the top three.

Nathaniel Bostic and his wife Rebecca are co-advisors for TBK8’s chapter of TSA, which is a national organization made up of 250,000 middle and high school students in about 2,000 schools.

The Bostics say they will take 18 students to the TSA national competition, which will be held in June in Washington, D.C. They hope to be able to bring along the Wharton team, which is made up of a pair of the TBK8 TSA chapter’s alumni.

“It’s exciting for us to see our former students, now in ninth, tenth and eleventh grade,” says Nathaniel Bostic. “They’re coming back to work with our kids and mentor them, and also grow in their own projects.”

Find out more about the TSA chapter at TBK8 by visiting TBK8TSA.org.

Congratulations to the following students, all of whom placed in the top three in their respective categories:

TBK8 First-Place Finishers: Jake Dostal, Danielle Arrigio and Simon DuPriest for Bio Tech; Rajuta Kansara, Antra Sharma, Emily You and Sophie Tian for Children’s Stories; Riley Hall for Essays on Technology; Aubrey Glover, Sayeed Azam and Roman LaRock for Mechanical Engineering; Emily You and Sophie Tian, Technical Design.

TBK8 Second-Place Finishers: Aubrey Glover and Sayeed Azam for Challenging Technology Issues; Riley Hall and Ryan Hutchinson for Coding; Ashlynn Costello for Digital Photography; Alexis Cowles, Tyler McDowell, Abigail Welsh and Danielle Arrigio for Off the Grid.

TBK8 Third-Place Finishers: Ryan Hutchinson and Tyler Yee for Electrical Application; Sayeed Azam for Flight; 

Nyasa Kumar, Danielle Arrigio, Kiara Torres and Arnav A. for Inventions and Innovations; Riley Hall, Julan Carvajal, Alonzo Reroma and Pranav Magaluru for Website Design.

Wharton Third-Place Finishers: Tim Norwood and Rachel Welsh, 3rd place, Structural Design.

LIBERTY SHINES AT FBLA:Students from Liberty Middle School (see photo, above) were award winners at the 2019 Future Business Leaders of America (FBLA) State Leadership Conference, held in Orlando March 22-25. 

Congratulations to Shreya Gullapalli (1st place, Business Etiquette), Uma Panchal (2nd, Business Etiquette), Amulya Ravipati (5th, Business Etiquette), John Madadha (3rd, Business Math and Financial Literacy), Destiny Nieves and Tanvi Chetal (4th, Community Service), Sai Aashrith Kossireddy (3rd, Elevator Speech), Kenzo Cogswell (3rd, Introduction to Business Communication), Keerthi Penumuchu (2nd, Keyboarding), Sofia Murrin (3rd, Keyboarding), Yana Kumar (4th, Keyboarding), Pavan Moturi (3rd, Multimedia & Website Design), Dante Boin (3rd, Spreadsheet) and Olivia Kurtz (4th, Spreadsheet).

Shreya Gullapalli, the school’s first-place finisher in Business Etiquette, will be recognized for her achievement at the Hillsborough County Public Schools School Board meeting in May. All of the winners named are eligible to attend FBLA’s National Leadership Conference in San Antonio, TX, this summer.

“We are really proud of all of our chapter representatives, because from 24 competitors, 13 placed at the state level. One of our members placed first in Business Etiquette and she is eligible to attend nationals,” said Sofia Murrin, Chapter President, “and our entire chapter was inspired to continue with FBLA in high school and beyond.”

Future Business Leaders of America-Phi Beta Lambda, Inc., is the largest career student business organization in the world, with more than 230,000 members.

Philanthropist Dr. Kiran Patel Opens His Charter High School This Fall

Patel High School founder Dr. Kiran Patel (left) and principal Marlee Strawn are among the innovative thinkers who are bringing Patel High — a tuition-free charter school — to life.

When school starts back up again this August for the 2019-20 school year, 300 ninth graders will walk the halls of a brand new charter high school being built just off E. Fowler Ave. near I-75.

The tuition-free charter school is open to any student who is close enough to commute, including those who live in Pasco County.

“The goal is to provide an option to students who may be limited in the curriculum and extracurricular activities in their present environment,” explains Dr. Kiran C. Patel, a local entrepreneur and philanthropist who is the school’s founder.

The school is officially called Dr. Kiran C. Patel High School, but will be called Patel High. “Simply because you belong to a certain neighborhood should not force you to stay in that neighborhood [for school],” he says. “We are providing a choice.”

Dr. Patel — or “Dr. K,” as he is affectionately called — committed $20 million to launch the school. The Tampa resident’s business enterprises include luxury real estate development, medical software, health care solutions and commercial property acquisition and management. The success of these businesses has allowed him to make impactful contributions on a global scale, which he has done through the establishment of schools, colleges and hospitals on three continents. 

“Dr. K is the epitome of compassion, community service and humanitarian efforts,” says Ashok Bagdy, a New Tampa resident and a co-founder of the school, along with Bagdy’s wife, Kavita Jain, and Sonali Judd, who is Dr. Patel’s daughter. “He has made a tremendous impact on the two things that matter most — education and health care. His contributions have been inspirational, transformational and generational.”

Dr. Patel is much more than just a benefactor, as he will be very involved with the institution that bears his name, hoping to impart some of his personal philosophy to the students who will attend.

“Today’s world is focused on human rights,” Dr. Patel explains, “but nobody is focused on human responsibility. It’s that aspect that’s more important than your rights. What is your responsibility to your neighbor? You may have a right to do anything you want, but is that the responsible thing to do?”

This rendering shows what Dr. Kiran C. Patel High School will look like when construction is completed on or around June 30. The school’s first 300 students will be ninth graders who will begin attending the school in August.

Students at Patel High will learn about responsibility through mentorship programs, opportunities for leadership and social projects that allow students, “to be contributing members of society at an early age,” says Dr. Patel.

About The School

Patel High’s inaugural class will consist of 300 freshmen. In future years, new freshman classes will be added, with the planned capacity of the school to be just 600 students total in grades nine through 12.

The school will offer an advanced curriculum and focus on the school’s mission statement, which emphasizes up-to-date knowledge and skills, personalized and innovative instruction, partnerships between the school and the community, social responsibility and leadership.

Mentors from throughout the community will work with students to give them the opportunity to explore potential career interests, community outreach and real-world applications. 

Students will experience project-based learning, a teaching method in which they gain knowledge and skills by investigating and responding to complex questions, problems or challenges. Students learn to take initiative, build confidence, solve problems, work in teams, communicate ideas, and manage time.  

The school’s lunch period will be called “Power Hour,” where students not only eat, but have extended time and opportunities to participate in open labs, clubs, tutoring, intensive intervention, or other academically enriching choices. They will be able to meet with teachers, catch up on assignments, and collaborate on projects with peers.  

Don’t Flip Out!

Patel High School also will use what’s called a “flipped classroom” approach when appropriate, meaning that instructional content is delivered outside of the classroom, often online, while moving other activities into the classroom. 

In a flipped classroom, students may watch online lectures, collaborate in online discussions, or carry out research at home. Then, they interactively engage in concepts in the classroom to clarify and apply that knowledge, giving teachers the opportunity to guide their students to deeper thinking and higher levels of application. 

Not only will Patel High be unique in its curriculum, schedule and students’ engagement with the outside world, it also is unique in its space design and flexible seating for students.

“It’s an opportunity for students to be in a brand new school with the most updated security features,” explains Bagdy, “It’s on a beautiful 32 acres, right off of I-75, and will have 67,000 square feet of building, including an 11,000-square-foot gym, for only 600 students.”

He says the school will have world-class facilities, including a gathering place they refer to as a “wow space,” an amphitheater, and innovative touches such as movable walls so teams of teachers can adjust how they use their classrooms.

The school also includes a music room, soccer field, baseball field and tennis courts. As to exactly what sports and music programs will be offered at Patel High, Bagdy says that will be left up to the students.

“It’s a student-driven school, and it’s a blank slate,” he says. “They’ll decide on the mascot, clubs and sports.”

A national search to hire a principal brought in 250 resumes and ultimately led the school’s board to select a candidate from right here in Tampa. Marlee Strawn was most recently assistant principal of curriculum at Bell Creek Academy 6-12 Charter School in Riverview, where she created and implemented a High School Cambridge Advanced International Certificate of Education (AICE) curriculum. The Cambridge curriculum also will be used at Patel High.

Students Chosen By Lottery

Students who will be entering the ninth grade next school year and who are interested in attending Patel High must apply online at PatelHighSchool.org. Students are chosen to attend the school through a random lottery process.

“This is a lottery system; anybody can put their name in the hat,” says Dr. Patel. “We are not selective in identifying a segment of society by color or economic status or anything like that.”

While New Tampa and Wesley Chapel residents are invited to apply to the Patel High lottery, preference will be given to students in Hillsborough County. There are currently seats still available for this fall’s class.

Cypress Creek Town Center Lands Three More Restaurants

Bloomin’ Brands, which is well-known locally for opening the first Outback Steakhouse in Tampa in 1988, is looking to bring three of its other restaurants to the Cypress Creek Town Center on S.R. 56.

The Tampa-based company met on April 23 with Pasco County officials and submitted preliminary plans for building a Bonefish Grill, Carrabba’s Italian Grill and an Aussie Grill by Outback on the northeast corner of the S.R. 56 and Wesley Chapel Blvd. intersection., west of the Walk-On’s Bistreaux & Bar that will open in less than two months.

The Bonefish Grill, which has a location on Bruce B. Downs Blvd. just south of S.R. 56, will be 5,585 sq. ft. and will seat 195 customers, while the Carrabba’s Italian Grill is proposed for 6,438 sq. ft. and 229 seats for customers. The two restaurants will be next to each other facing S.R. 56.

The Aussie Grill by Outback, the company’s first fast-casual take on the Outback Steakhouse model, was developed for international growth – it has locations in Hong Kong and Saudi Arabia. Tampa will see opening of a location at the International Plaza food court this month.

At the Cypress Creek Town Center, the Aussie Grill will have seating for 72 customers in a 2,800-sq.ft. space.

Chick-fil-A On S.R. 54 Sets The Date


What we first reported in 2015 is about to become a reality.

Chick-fil-A will open its second Wesley Chapel location, at 28295 S.R. 54, on Thursday, May 2.

In its traditional, 15-year fashion, Chick-fil-A will hold a First 100 event, allowing the first 100 customers in line at the Grand Opening to win free meals (consisting of a Chick-fil-A chicken sandwich, medium waffle potato fries and a medium beverage) for a year.

There will be a First 100 Campout party, with games and Chick-fil-A food, leading into the morning opening. You will be able to register in the new store’s parking lot beginning at 6 p.m. on Wednesday, May 1.

The event is open to guests who live in the vicinity of the restaurant, so make sure you check out the eligible zip codes RIGHT HERE.

Prizes will be awarded shortly before 6 a.m. on May 2, and the restaurant will open shortly afterward.

Jim Larreau, a Tampa native, will operate the new Chick-fil-A. He is transferring from St. Petersburg’s Chick-fil-A at Tyrone Blvd. restaurant, where his team earned the Symbol of Success – Chick-fil-A’s highest honor for its Operators.

Larreau is partnering with Bridging Freedom to combat domestic minor sex trafficking during his grand opening celebration. He is encouraging First 100 participants and guests taking part in the Wesley Chapel event to bring items such as individual craft kits, toilet paper, paper towels, tissues, healthy snacks and gardening seeds during the grand opening week to be donated to Bridging Freedom.

Chick-fil-A always seem to have long lines, but Larreau says, “I hope to be the quickest Chick-fil-A drive thru in the Southeast.”