CITY Furniture is under construction on a nearly-9-acre site next to Chicken Guy & the Floor & Decor store on the north side of S.R. 56. The Home2 Suites hotel is planned, but is not yet under construction next to the Hyatt Place hotel. (NN map is not to scale & only shows approximate locations)Â
We first told you back in 2023 that CITY Furniture was planning to build a 120,000-sq.-ft. showroom on a 400,000-sq.-ft. (8.92-acre) parcel valued at $3.774 million, across S.R. 56 from the Tampa Premium Outlets, near the Floor & Decor store (see map).
Well, the site work for CITY Furniture recently began (photo below; the Silversaw Apartments are in the background) and Maitland, FL-based Miller Construction Co., is doing the construction. We’ll keep you posted as CITY Furniture gets closer to completion and its opening.Â
To the east of the latest furniture store planned to open in the Wesley Chapel area will be the Home2 Suites by Hilton – Wesley Chapel hotel that will be developed by Impact Properties, the same group that built and still owns the nearly adjacent Hyatt Place Tampa Wesley Chapel hotel.Â
Although we don’t know when the construction of the 103-room, five-story, 66,913-sq.-ft. Home2 Suites is expected to begin, the last update we received said it was expected to open sometime in 2026.
An interesting thing about the hotel is that it will be constructed on only a two-acre site (less than 1/4 the size of the CITY Furniture site), valued at $1.112 million. — GN, with research by Joel Provenzano
Wednesday, September 24, 11:30 a.m.-1 p.m. – North Tampa Bay Chamber Economic Development Briefing. At Pasco Hernando State College, Porter Campus (2727 Mansfield Blvd., Conference Center, 3rd Floor). Tampa’s Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital has been providing care to the children of the greater Tampa Bay area for almost 100 years. In order to bring expert care closer to home for many children, for the first time, a brand new pediatric acute care hospital will open in Wesley Chapel. Join the Chamber for an intriguing discussion about a myriad of topics with our panel members: Justin Olsen, COO & Joseph Perno, M.D., VP of Medical Affairs – at Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital; Teresa Campbell, architect & principal in charge, HKS Architects; and Bryan Durkin, operations manager, Robins & Morton. The cost to attend this event is $25.
“We wanted to create a secure place for kids (ages 6 & under) to play indoors where their parents can enjoy delicious coffee and tea (and other beverages) and a comfortable place to sit and watch their kids,” Moudy says. “We’ve already had great support from the local community.”
Wondergrounds also offers a delicious variety of rotating, locally baked cakes and pastries, although Moudy says, “We will always have the rainbow cake (lower left in the photo below).”
The unique play area, which offers extra-wide spaces for parents who want to join their kids, also offers a colorful “village” area (below) with different small buildings and a fire truck.Â
Wondergrounds (open 9 a.m.-7 p.m. every day) has a party room, membership plans and single-day pricing on weekdays and weekends (please note that reservations are required for non-member weekend play) — with grip socks on sale for just $3. For more info, call (813) 575-7529 or visit WondergroundsPlayCafe.com. — GN
It’s no secret that Zukku-San Sushi Bar & Grill, located in the small strip plaza next to the Hyatt Place hotel across S.R. 56 from the Tampa Premium Outlets has been among my favorite restaurants in Wesley Chapel — including my #1 fave for 2024! — since the day it first opened back in late 2020.Â
So, what could make Zukku-San even better? How about the most unique and delicious weekend brunch in “The Chap?”
Co-owner and executive chef Gia Tran was proud to introduce us to the new weekend brunch menu items on the first day brunch was offered — two weeks before we went to press with this issue. Gia and his partner Ferdian Jap now own five fast-casual Zukku Sushi places in four states (including at Tampa’s Armature Works), three Ato Burritos & Bowls (including in The KRATE at The Grove), Astro Ice Cream (also on Sierra Center Blvd.) and have another Zukku-San opening soon in Orlando.
Gia (left) told us that he’s been “cooking up” the ideas for almost all of the items on the opening brunch menu (which he said will be expanded) “for a couple of years,” but just couldn’t seem to pull the trigger on getting it started.Â
“I knew I wanted to include some ingredients that you almost never find at an Asian restaurant,” Gia told yours truly, photographer Charmaine George and Charmaine’s boyfriend Brendan. “Have you ever had fried eggs, ube waffles or bacon at an Asian place?”
The answer was clearly “no” from all of us, and I’ll be honest that I wasn’t 100% sure I was going to love all of the new items — until I actually tried them. Of course, the only things I couldn’t try were the new “Bird’s Nest” sushi roll (right photo) and the “Zukku- San Signature Mary” (one of the two drinks above) because both included fried shrimp.Â
But, Charmaine and Brendan both raved about them, especially the Bird’s Nest, which combines tempura shrimp, salmon and cucumber, topped with avocado and real crab (not “krab”), plus a poached egg, scallions, masago, eel sauce, spicy mayo and sesame seeds.
Meanwhile, the Signature Mary has Haku Japanese vodka, wasabi paste, soy sauce and Bloody Mary mix, with Sichuan peppercorn bitters, garnished with a California roll, tempura shrimp, pickled ginger and celery, with a black-&- white sesame seed rim. There’s also an option to add sriracha to this Mary “for extra spice.”
But, all of us honestly went bonkers for all of the other choices. The other brunch sushi roll was a Quail Roll (left photo), which combined tamago, cucumber and avocado, topped with two sunny-side-up quail eggs (shockingly tasty), plus bacon (yes, bacon!), scallions, “lava aioli,” eel sauce and Japanese togarashi spice. I don’t know if I’ve ever had that last ingredient before, but the entire sushi roll was just soooo tasty.Â
I’ve also never really been a big fan of Eggs Benedict, so the new Crispy Rice Benedict (right photo) was something of a revelation, with its crispy rice topped with (again, real) snow crab, poached egg and a never-heard-of miso brown butter Hollandaise sauce that Gia said stays blended longer than most Hollandaise sauces because of the miso. We all agreed we had never tasted anything like it.Â
But wait, there’s more! I know we just hosted the first-ever Wesley Chapel fried chicken tender contest, but there is a new contender in town, as Zukku-San’s Ube Waffle & Fried Chicken combo (top right photo) is a combination of three thick slabs of the crispiest (and yet, still juicy) panko-fried chicken served with three of the only waffles I’ve ever had made from ube — also known as the vibrant purple yam (sweet potato) originally used primarily in The Philippines. The waffles also are topped with a generous dollop of creamy ube butter and served with a sake cup of ginger maple syrup. If you’re the kind of person who tries the fried-chicken-&-waffles at every place that serves them and don’t think this is among the best you’ve ever had, feel free to let me know what you didn’t love about it.Â
Gia said that his pastry chef Alex Winchester (above left photo) went through “like ten different waffle irons” before finding the one that would give his ube waffles the proper texture and crunch.Â
We all were honestly too stuffed to want to even order dessert, but Gia insisted we try Alex’s new mango & passion fruit sponge cake (left), which isn’t even on the dessert menu yet, but it was excellent and the whipped tropical icing is addictive. And yes, we still found a way to polish it off — are you surprised?Â
I also enjoyed my lychee mimosa (at left in top left photo) enough to not need a shot of my usual Ballyhoo Irish whiskey (found only at Zukku-San locally) with my meal. Other Brunch beverages include an Asian Mary, a Sake Mimosa and a Green Tea Umeshu Martini. Try these for yourself and let me know what you think.Â
And yes, if these brunch items somehow don’t do it for you (but my opinion is that you’d have to be crazy, or a vegetarian, to not at least try some or all of them), Zukku-San’s full menu is still available during the weekend brunch hours — which are every Saturday & Sunday, 11 a.m.-3 p.m.
Zukku-San is located at 25916 Sierra Center Blvd. It is open for lunch & dinner every day at 11 a.m. and stays open until 9 p.m. on Sun., 9:30 p.m. on Mon.-Thur., and until 10 p.m. on Fri. & Sat. Reservations are not required (except for larger parties), but are definitely suggested, especially on the weekends. For more information, call (813) 419-1351, visit ZukkuSushi.com. And please, tell Gia and Alex and the entire crew that I sent you!Â
Retired New York Fire Department emergency medical technician Stephen Spelman can’t forget 9/11 or the colleagues he lost that day, and he has continued to do everything he can to not let local residents forget it, either, since moving to Wesley Chapel in 2010. Spelman received a piece of the Ladder 18 fire truck destroyed that day from a former fire captain friend of his who also was part of Motts Military Museum in Groveport, OH, where Spelman was scheduled to speak at a 9/11 event in 2017, when Hurricane Irma hit Florida, so he couldn’t make the trip. Spelman arrived at the World Trade Center in his vehicle as the North Tower was getting ready to fall on September 11, 2001. The truck itself was destroyed by falling debris, but the lives of the firefighters from Ladder 18 were saved by jumping under the ladder. “Ironically, I was about 30 yards from that (fire) truck when the North Tower collapsed,” Spelman said. A few weeks after he had to cancel his speaking engagement in Ohio in 2017, Spelman received the piece of the ladder truck in his mailbox.
Spelman was one of the featured speakers at St. Leo’s event on Sept. 8, which also featured Lt. Col. Perry Blackburn from the movie “12 Strong,” as well as Craig Gross, a Gold Star Family member whose son, Cpl. Frank Gross, was killed in Afghanistan, retired NYFD/EMS lieutenant Dominick Maggiori, Florida Commissioner of Agriculture Wilton Simpson, District 2 Pasco County Commissioner Seth Weightman, new St. Leo president Jim Burkee, Bob Hatfield from Congressman Gus Bilirakis’ office and Spelman’s son Matthew.
Simpson said, “Memory fades if it is not told. Thus, the history of September 11 and its heroes must be shared and told.”
Maggiori shared his 9/11 story and of working “on the pile” – the rubble of the World Trade Center towers. “We heard a jet, and the work stopped,” he said. “Then we saw it was a [U.S.] fighter jet and there was a sigh of relief. Somebody has got our back.”
And it was more than just the U.S. military. “People came from all over,” Maggiori said, bringing water, food, and volunteering in any way they could to assist those involved in rescue and recovery. “Everyone pulled together.”
As a Green Beret, Blackburn was one of the first Americans on the ground in Afghanistan after 9/11. “I was the leader of the greatest fighting force on the ground,” he told the audience at Saint Leo.
They rode on horseback with Afghans, “hunting those responsible, and I was proud be help to defeat the Taliban and Al-Qaida,” he said. “The American soldier is not an individual. 9/11 brought out the best in all Americans. We stood together. We prayed together. That’s the part I carry with me every day. Show up for one another.”
For Spelman, the event at Saint Leo as well as the memorial featuring the piece of the ladder truck, is about carrying on the legacy – the legacy of those lost, of those who battle cancer and other illnesses from their time working in the dust and debris, and those who suffer mental anguish, alcoholism, and drug addiction following that horrific day. “I wasn’t prepared for what I saw,” Spelman said. “It was the horror of war. I’m not military, but it seemed like a battlefield.”
He was teaching at the NY fire academy when the first terrorist struck, grabbed what gear he could find, headed to his duty station, and then toward the towers, going the wrong way on the street.
“We could see people jumping from the building, and we weren’t even close [yet],” he said. “We could see the towers engulfed in flames about midway up.”
A NYFD lieutenant sent him and his team to look inside police and other vehicles parked nearby to see if anyone was alive. The lieutenant ran the opposite direction toward the towers. “I’m alive,” Spelman said. “He saved my life.”
He told the Neighborhood News after the event, “There were like 180 people there. It was an amazing event.”
Never Forget
The In Their Honor 5K kicked off the events at 7:30 a.m. today (September 8) and the route through Saint Leo’s campus featured more than 300 photos of firefighters who lost their lives on September 11, 2001. Funds raised through the event will support the sponsoring organizations and charities, including the creation of the Children of Heroes Scholarship at Saint Leo University. Representing the shared mission between the Pasco Patriots Association and Saint Leo University, this fund will provide tuition assistance for first responders and the children of fallen and catastrophically injured first responders. Tom DeLuca, executive director of the Pasco Patriots Association and a U.S. Marine Corps veteran, served as the emcee for the memorial program.
Coming across the 5K finish line first was Kevin Perez, a University of South Florida student and a member of the Suncoast Battalion of Army ROTC. Right behind him was Austin Curtis, also a USF student and ROTC member.
All eyes were on the sky following the 5K as parachutists Rian Kanouff, Keith Hanley, and Patrick Fortune of Fortune’s Flags in the Air and Skydive First Project, glided to the ground with Fortune carrying a billowing U.S. flag.
Bagpipers Gemma Riggs and Thomas Fritz played as everyone entered Saint Leo’s Wellness Center for the memorial program, which featured a prayer by Mike D’Ambrosio, mayor of the town of St. Leo, and the national anthem performed by Marlee Michael.
Sponsors The sponsors for the event were the town of St. Leo, Chick-fil-A Zephyrhills, Totally Blu Pools, and Campus Gear and Trade Mark Sales.
Beneficiaries Funds raised support the following nonprofit organizations: Saint Leo University – Scholarship, Pasco Patriots Association, 18 Series Coffee Co., AFG Free, Cryoeeze22, Krewe De Forti, PCRetiredK-9 (Pasco County Retired K9), Tunnel to Towers Foundation, and Warrior Wellness.
