If you are looking for authentic, and tasty, Australian cuisine, the Walkabout Australian Bakery & Cafรฉ is open at 18430 Livingston Ave. (at Sunset Ln.) in Lutz.
Owner Regina McColl is a truly authentic Australian, from Melbourne, but weโre fortunate that she has brought the flavors of her home country to within 10-15 minutes of most New Tampa residents.
The bakery goods are truly unlike anything Iโve had in the Tampa Bay area. Thereโs a square one that looked like it could be chocolate and peanut butter, but is actually caramel inside and itโs absolutely addictive. Sorry that I neglected to take a picture of it, but thereโs no doubt Iโll be back.
Regina McColl
Walkabout, which celebrated its Grand Opening with a May 2 North Tampa Bay Chamber ribbon cutting, also serves great food, like the thick-cut prime rib, with mashed potatoes and broccoli shown left. Regina also put out finger foods like yummy traditional meat pies (similar to empanadas), and spinach ricotta feta triangles for the Chamber event. Oh, and of course, thereโs beer and wine, too, mate!
For more info, visit AussieBakeryCafe.com or call (813) 953-1085, and please tell Regina I sent you!
The Man Caveโs Grand Opening
Another great locally-owned business that recently cut a ribbon was The Man Cave Haircuts for Men, which actually celebrated its one-year anniversary on April 1 with a North Tampa Bay Chamber ribbon cutting.
Located in the Pinebrook at The Grove plaza at 27419 Wesley Chapel Blvd. (S.R. 54) in Wesley Chapel, owner Katie Galentine has created a shop that is less barber shop and more salon for men, but with a variety of unique dรฉcor touches that make any man feel right at home โ like spray bottles that look like bourbon bottles and shelves made out of tires. You also get a shampoo, with a complimentary steam towel, scalp massage and walk-ins and appointments are welcome.
For more info, call (813) 574-8405, or visit the-man-cave-haircuts-for-men.business.site and tell Katie and her crew the New Tampa Neighborhood News sent you!
Iโm not going to say that Jamaican cuisine has ever been among my top favorites, but I will say this โ as a native New Yorker who has previously sampled some well-known Jamaican restaurants in Manhattan, there are a number of dishes Iโm going to keep going back to the new Hummingbird Jerk House to enjoy.
Owner Patrick Murrel, a Hunterโs Green resident, and his family invite you to sample truly some of the best Jamaican cuisine Iโve had the chance to try, especially in Tampa.
The Hummingbird Jerk House, located in the space previously occupied by Dairy Queen, on Bruce B. Downs (BBD) Blvd. in North Palms Village (next to Oakleyโs Grille), features everything from authentic meat patties to items Iโve previously never (and still havenโt) tried, such as cow foot and butter beans (with dumplings) and what is billed on the menu as the Jamaican National Dish called ackee and saltfish.
According to Hummingbirdโs website, Patrick is from the Westmoreland province of Jamaica and grew up in the town of Sav-la-mar, next to Negril. The website says his โmama teach him to cook,โ and from the items Iโve sampled so far, Iโd say she taught him well!
The Best Fried Chicken?
Chicken is obviously a staple of Jamaican cuisine, based on the Hummingbird Jerk Houseโs menu. And, not surprisingly, three of my favorite dishes are the jerk chicken, the brown stew chicken and some of the best fried chicken Iโve had at any kind of restaurant in Tampa. The fried chicken is super-crisp, but still tender and served on the bone, with a side of Patrickโs signature and super-tasty brown stew sauce, plus sides like white rice or rice and peas (beans), plantains and veggies, which are usually either sliced carrots or carrots and cabbage. Iโd love to see some additional veggies on the menu, but the sliced carrots are particularly tasty.
Jerk chicken dish.
Lead video editor Gavin Olsen and I both also enjoyed the jerk chicken at Hummingbird Jerk House, although it doesnโt have quite as much kick as some jerk chicken Iโve sampled. Even so, it is full of flavor and thereโs always a couple of different hot sauces on the tables, if you need a bigger jolt from your jerk. Thereโs also BBQ and curry chicken on the menu, but I hadnโt sampled either at our press time.
Speaking of the brown stew sauce, for those who crave sauce all over their chicken, there is a brown stew chicken on the menu, which is basically similar to the fried chicken but covered with the sauce. The brown stew sauce also is tasty on Patrickโs whole snapper, although heโll warn you that the whole snapper does have bones, so itโs a little bit of work to enjoy this zesty dish.
From what Iโve seen during my multiple visits to the restaurant, the more popular snapper seems to be the escoveitch, which is available bone-in or as a filet (which is likely how I will try it in the future). The snapper is fried and then covered in onions, sliced carrots, scotch bonnet peppers, pepper and vinegar. Thereโs also jerk salmon on the menu, although I donโt usually enjoy salmon other than smoked and on a bagel.
Meat patties are a popular item at the Hummingbird Cafe.
I havenโt yet sampled the ackee (a Caribbean fruit) and saltfish (cod), but many of the Hummingbird Jerk Houseโs regulars rave about it. I did, however, sample the Japanese coco bread with saltfish, a doughy appetizer which is slightly sweet from coconut milk.
Other Jamaican staples Iโve sampled at the Hummingbird Jerk House include the oxtail and the curry goat.
Iโve never been the biggest curry fan (although Jamaican curry is different than Thai or Indian curry) and I donโt go out of my way toย eat goat, but I really enjoyed the oxtail. It is โstewed downโ with Jamaican herbs and butter beans in a savory brown sauce and is very tasty and tender. It does take a little work to get at all of the available meat, but trust me, itโs worth it. I definitely also plan to try Patrickโs beef stew โ which is only available Thur.-Sun. Other menu items include Rastaman vegetable stew, soups (including Manish-Water, or goat soup), chicken wings and roti skin sandwich wraps with curry chicken or goat, jerk chicken or veggies.
Breakfast, Too?
Patrick is proud to have recently announced that he is now serving authentic Jamaican breakfast favorites on Sat. and Sun. mornings (8 a.m.-11:30 a.m.). Among the breakfast items are salt mackerel, ackee and saltfish with cooked green bananas, dumplings and more, plus porridges of cornmeal and oats.
And of course, any time you walk into a place and the music of the great man himself โ Bob Marley โ is playing, youโre bound to feel good. And, at the Hummingbird Jerk House, youโre also likely to leave satisfied.
Hummingbird Jerk House (17631 BBD, Unit F) is open 11:30 a.m.-7 p.m. on Sun., and every other day 11 a.m.-10 p.m., except it is closed on Mon. For more info, visit HummingbirdJerkHouse.com or call (813) 512-2558.ย ย
When I first met Anass El-Omari and his wife Susana Herrera several months ago, I was hopeful that their plan to completely revamp not just the look of the clubhouse at Lexington Oaks Golf Club, but also the food served there would work out for them. After all, we have plenty of chain restaurants in Wesley Chapel, but we have so few non-chain, sit-down, mom-&-pop restaurants in our area with great food.
Well, if you havenโt tried Omariโs Grill & Bar at Lexington Oaks yet, I hope the pictures on this page and this short writeup will convince you to go check it out.
Anass, who is originally from Morocco, was trained at the world-renowned Cordon Bleu Institute in Paris, France, and just from the sauces he has been serving alone, his extensive training and experience is obvious.
Anass met Susana in her native Colombia, where she was working as a TV network news anchor for RCN Television (Radio Cadena Nacional) in the Colombian capital city of Bogota.
About two years ago, his varied business interests (including banking software) brought their family (they have two children together) from Colombia to Florida, first to the Grand Hampton community in New Tampa and eventually, to Wesley Chapel, where he ended up buying the Lexington Oaks golf course and restaurant, a change of ownership that took place about a year ago.
โWe were planning to just buy a small vacation home in Epperson, because of the lagoon, but the kids loved it here, so this is now home.โ
Oh Yeah, The Food!
The lunch and dinner menus at Omariโs Grill may be somewhat limited, but thereโs no doubt that all of the dishes Jannah and I have sampled together so far have been outstanding โ and Anass is always coming up with daily specials.
My favorite items on the dinner menu are the flounder almendrine, which I thought I had shown in my Nibbles & Bytes column before, and the Chef filet.
For only $14.99, the flounder is sautรฉed in a Mediterranean-style butter sauce, with large chunks of fresh tomatoes. The 6-oz. filet ($20.99) is super tender and served with a fresh basil and white wine cream sauce. It was served with two fresh asparagus spears and we also enjoyed a side of cheesy baked broccoli.
The Chef filet
I also love the fresh pear and brie cheese and the calamari appetizers and the Cajun chicken pasta with onions, peppers and salami in a semi-spicy Cajun cream sauce.
Although I canโt indulge in any of the multiple shrimp and lobster options on the menu because of my accursed shellfish allergy, Susana says her favorite dish on the menu is the lobster pasta, which is linguine served with generous chunks of lobster in a ginger cream sauce, with a touch of garlic and white wine.ย
The mahi-mahi, served with a mango salsa.
The special on our most recent visit was a super-thick cut of amazingly fresh mahi-mahi, served with a mango salsa that added a delicious touch of fruit without being overly sweet.ย
Although dinner currently is only served at Omariโs Grill Wednesday-Friday, it is open for lunch every day except Monday and the lunch menu features plenty of your favorite sandwiches, including Anassโ take on the classic Cuban, a Cajun chicken sandwich with bacon and cheese (of course), a Philly cheesesteak, classic BLT, as well as burgers, wings, a Buffalo chicken wrap and even shrimp tacos.
Strawberry cheesecake
Iโve only sampled Omariโs catering-style food for lunch when Iโve visited the Rotary Club of Wesley Chapel, which meets for lunch at Omariโs every Wednesday at noon. Anass and Susana donโt only host the club, theyโre also members and say they look forward to getting more involved with the Rotaryโs service projects, especially since the Lexington Oaks golf course is getting ready to close for renovations for three months shortly after this issue reaches you.
โWhile the greens are being resurfaced,โ says Anass, โwe will be really focusing on the restaurant side. Weโll do a lot more menu specials and host more special events.โ
Speaking of specialย events, Susana says that the Easter brunch held last month โcompletely sold out.โ But, despite lots of requests, Anass says he will not repeat the brunch special for Motherโs Day, so he and Susana can spend her special day together.
โI havenโt had a day off in 243 days,โ he says. โBut, Iโll be thinking about new specials.โ
Oh, and before I forget to mention it, you should always save room for dessert at Omariโs Grill. All of the desserts are homemade, including an authentically French creme brulee and the totally decadent New York-style cheese cake shown in the far right photo on this page, which is served with fresh strawberries and a chocolate sauce that has other ingredients Anass wouldnโt share with me. โThe sauce is a secret,โ he says with a smile.
Omariโs also caters to families with an affordable kids menu (nothing more than $5) and there is a beautiful covered patio that can seat about as many people as the inside dining area, which features a premium, full-liquor bar with very reasonable prices.
For more information about Omariโs Grill & Bar (26133 Lexington Oaks Blvd.), call (813) 907-7270 or visit LexingtonOaksGolf.com and please tell Anass and Susana I sent you! ย
Office & sales assistant Janet Levins checks in readers at our โ25 Years of Neighborhood Newsโ Celebration at Bayscape Bistro.
When I purchased Neighborhood News on February 26, 1994, with a former partner, I had no idea Iโd still be doing the same job 25 years later.ย
At that time, this was a once-a-month, quarter-folded direct mail newspaper with only โspotโ color (not full color) on four pages,that was delivered to 6,500 households in what wasnโt even yet referred to as โNew Tampa.โ Our only Wesley Chapel distribution back then were the few hundred copies that were being dropped off each month at the Meadow Pointe I clubhouse. I quickly added mailing to the first few hundred homes in the original portion of Meadow Pointe, as well as to the few hundred homes in the community surrounding Saddlebrook Resort.
All I knew then was that, in addition to homes, roads with no traffic signals and thousands of heads of cattle, the areas that would one day be called New Tampa and Wesley Chapel had a lot of vacant land, most of which already had development plans in place. I started calling the phone numbers on every sign along both Bruce B. Downs (BBD) Blvd. in New Tampa (at that time, the portion in Pasco County was only known as County Road 581) and Cross Creek Blvd.
And even though the Neighborhood News I purchased already had a reasonable number of advertisers, I knew that the key to getting people to actually read the publication was to tell them about the plans for the new developments coming to their community.
Celebration attendees got to enjoy delicious appetizers.
As you can see from the first few of the 50 covers (see gallery below), I and my โstaffโ of one part-time writer/editor made sure that we told the residents in my two distribution areas everything we could about the plans for the homes, apartments, businesses, roads, libraries, churches and recreational opportunities that were coming โin the future.โ
Well, 25 years later, I and my still-small staff of one outstanding full-time managing editor, a few great freelance writers and a few in-house support staffers continue to give you more news and information about everything that is still coming to our now-separate distribution areas.
A certain publisher plays to the crowd.
The 50 Neighborhood News front pages include an average of two covers per year for every year weโve been in business, although there are a few years along the way that didnโt make it to these pages โ not because nothing โimportantโ happened those years, but because most of these front pages are about โfirsts,โ meaning the first story we published (and believe me, especially in the beginning, no other local news media covered most of the stories we did) about a particular subject affecting our readers.ย
In order to give you that true historical perspective in a small amount of available space, there arenโt nearly as many covers from the era of 2015 until the present, even though managing editor John C. Cotey has probably broken as many big news stories in those 3+ years as I did between 1994-2000, but most of you have been here for most of Johnโs biggest stories, whereas the vast majority of our readers werenโt living here from the start.
But, What About The Party?
So, even though my anniversary of buying the paper was actually in February of โ94, my first issue as the publisher and editor was April of that year. In addition, as we told you on last issueโs cover, I got married in late March, so I didnโt really want to host the party until after that event.
I was thrilled that Eddie Bujarski and his wife Lourdes, the owners of the Bayscape Bistro in the Heritage Isles Golf Club on Cross Creek Blvd. in New Tampa, agreed to not only host the party on April 12, but also to put out a beautiful spread of both hot and cold munchies for what turned out to be more than 100 guests. I, of course, provided a karaoke DJ for the event, just as I had done at our first โMeet the Publisherโ karaoke party way back in May of โ94.
But, most of the folks who attended the 25th anniversary event werenโt there to sing (even though Jannah and I and some of our friends may have been) โ almost every reader who attended said they just wanted to be there to thank me for being an important part of their lives here in New Tampa and Wesley Chapel. We had folks from Epperson to the north and Tampa Palms to the south, and from Lexington Oaks to the west to K-Bar Ranch to the east attend and many came in groups of people who all had at least one thing in common โ they all love the Neighborhood News!
I also was thrilled that several of our wonderful advertisers also found time to check out the celebration โ and find out more about our new Video & Online Subscriptions. Among the attendees were Realtors Karen Tillman-Gosselin and her husband Renynold Gosselin,ย James and Alexis Staten of Olympus Pools, Pam Edmonson of Creative Permanent Makeup by Pam, Derek Usman of Usman Law Firmย and Ramses Garcia of Las Palmas Latin Grill all showed up to party with me, Jannah, John, office and sales assistant Janet Levins, senior video producer Gavin Olsen and his assistant Charmaine George.
As you can see, there are a lot of front pages weโve had to leave out to keep the number of our historic covers at only 50, especially from 2017-present.ย
Even so, pictured here are (left-right and top-bottom)our historic win as Small Business of the Year from what was then known as the Wesley Chapel Chamber of Commerce; Wesley Chapel resident Mike Mooreโs first election to the Pasco County Board of Commissioners; the Grand Opening of the Tampa Premium Outlets; our first story about the indoor sports complex which is finally beginning construction in Wiregrass; our first cover story about the โConnected Cityโ; our story about the definitive history of Wesley Chapel being published by a local author; our WCNT-tv Preview Party; the opening of what was then known as Florida Hospital Center Ice; the first Taste of New Tampa & Wesley Chapel hosted at the skating complex; our first explanation of the Diverging Diamond Intersection; a visit with the first families that moved into Epperson, prior to the opening of the Crystal Lagoonsยฎ amenity that is now open to the public (pg. 5); Johnโs great story about all of the new pizza places (almost all of which are now open) coming to Wesley Chapel; our nominee for our best New Tampa cover headline ever (โBruce B. Doneโ) and a certain publisherโs nuptials from last issue. Impressive, right? โ GN
A one-time multi-million dollar sports and fitness facility could be reborn as home to one of the Tampa Bay areaโs most popular craft breweries if Anthony Derby has his way.ย
The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Brew Bus Brewing and Florida Avenue Brewing Co. in Tampa says he is eyeing the former Sports + Field Family Athletic & Fitness Club complex on S.R. 56 to expand his current operations, and hopes to close on the property by the end of June.
โWe love the property, we love that area of town, but there are some things we need to work out and plan for,โ said Derby, who co-founded his brewing companies with his mother Toni Derby, who serves as the companyโs chief financial officer (CFO).
Anthony says he, architect Ken Cowart โ who also is the project architect for the St. Petersburg Pier โ and land-use attorney Anne Pollack met with Pasco County planning officials on April 17, and Derby says the meeting went well.
Derby says he plans to spend $8-9 million on the initial phase/renovations of the project, if it continues to move forward, developing a full-service restaurant and bar while utilizing what was once an outdoor field for training athletes as a beer garden.
โThe property has a great L-shape and that is going to help us create a nice little customer experience,โ Derby says. โRight now, this property is a really big deal for us.โ
The outdoor area also will serve as a family-friendly activities area with games and events, and that was one of the things that made the property even more attractive, along with its location on a busy stretch of S.R. 56 and its proximity to AdventHealth Center Ice, one of Wesley Chapelโs busiest spots.
The โbonesโ of the building itself remain in great shape, Derby adds, and he expects an extensive but fairly quick indoor renovation that could see the new craft brewery and restaurant open by this time next year.
Itโs the next piece of the puzzle out here,โ Derby says.
The tasting room at Florida Avenue Brewing Co.
While Wesley Chapel has its fair share of bars, it is not yet home to a craft brewery and restaurant like Brew Bus Brewing and Florida Avenue Brewing Co., which is located in Seminole Heights, at 4101 N. Florida Ave.
The company produces Florida Avenue and Brew Bus-branded beers at that location, also serving food and offering tours of other local breweries in Tampa.
The two-story building the Derbys are hoping to renovate as part of their expansion was originally developed by Strong-S Corporation and opened in 2005 as a $10.5-million fitness center that had multiple purposes. It held local basketball leagues on its NBA-sized court, and hosted a number of professional athletes who came there to train, like tennis player Jennifer Capriati and some of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. It also offered a number of fitness and massage options for community members.
Sports + Field promoted itself as the only local facility offering elite strength training for professionals and amateurs.
However, it closed in 2015, and while there was talk of a charter school or car dealership moving into the space, neither of those two plans materialized and the building has remained unused.
