12 highly anticipated new Bay Area restaurants for summer 2024 and beyond

The resilient Bay Area restaurant industry is gearing up for more exciting eatery openings in the coming months. Among them, a new rooftop bar in Walnut Creek. More high concept options for downtown San Jose. An eclectic restaurant and bar in Livermore. The flavors of Portugal in Gilroy.  And a renovation of a Mexican restaurant that’s been serving in Los Gatos for half a century

Here are a dozen of the most eagerly anticipated restaurants expected to make their debut in the last half of the year, with a few inching even closer to opening day.

Eos & Nyx, San Jose

The entrepreneurs behind an impressive restaurant venture named after the Greek goddesses of dawn and night — Eos & Nyx —  are hoping to energize a key downtown San Jose block with their modern Mediterranean concept.

Hospitality industry veterans Dan Phan, Johnny Wang and George Lahlouh, who co-own the spirit-centric MiniBoss, Paper Plane and Still OG, all downtown, are bullish on Urban Catalyst’s plans for Paseo, on the site of the old Century 12 movie complex.

They’ve leased nearly 4,000 square feet for their Eos & Nyx restaurant, and construction is well under way. Schematic designs show an angular and dramatic space with 20-foot-high ceilings, live trees and wood design elements.

General manager Ronald Bonafacio and executive chef Nicko Moulinos promise an innovative menu that features the influences of France, Spain, Italy, Greece and North Africa. Dinner, lunch, brunch and craft cocktails will be served both inside and alfresco.

Details: Planning a summer opening at 201 S. Second St., San Jose.

The Monk’s Kettle, Oakland

For nearly 17 years, The Monk’s Kettle served as a sort of church for beer lovers in San Francisco’s Mission District, pouring revered tipples like St. Bernardus Belgian Tripel and smoked Aecht Schlenkerla Urbock (gesundheit!).

But this spring, owners Christian Albertson and Nat Cutler posted a heartfelt Dear John letter announcing their intent to move out of the city, bemoaning the “crazy delivery fee numbers” and “drastically changed customer behavior” that’s damaged the pub environment. “I would say in a nutshell, the city just hasn’t recovered,” says Albertson. “And it’s not just from the pandemic, it’s really been in the works for the last decade where the economics of the city have really made people move out. In a way, we’re really chasing the clientele.”

Well, the Mission’s loss is Oakland’s gain – Rockridge’s, to be specific, that tony neighborhood of boutique shops and buzzy restaurants. The new Monk’s will feature a more spread-out space with perhaps 80 seats and plenty of standing room, plus parklets out front and a back deck with a roof trellis to protect against the elements. In other words, it’ll be a great place to hang for hours while guzzling beer and munching on chef Raiden Brenner’s elevated farm-to-table grub – including a much-lauded burger with stout-onion jam and gruyere, killer pretzels with beer cheese and fried-chicken sandos with hop-salt fries.

“We’re going to bring over our draft system with 28 drafts and do something similar with the bottle list of probably 60 to 80 bottles,” says Albertson. Those rotating drafts have featured the Russian River Brewing Company, Santa Rosa’s Moonlight Brewing and Fort Bragg’s North Coast Brewing, among others. With the move, expect East Bay beers — including Ghost Town, Cellarmaker and Temescal Brewing — to feature heavily as well.

“We’re just really excited and honestly, it feels in a way we’re getting back to what Monk’s was a decade ago, until the city fell apart and went a little haywire,” says Albertson. “We love the new space and neighborhood, and we couldn’t be happier.”

Details: Scheduled to open in September at 5484 College Ave., Oakland; monkskettle.com. (Monk’s also has a location in San Rafael.)

Pedro’s, Los Gatos

How many combination plates and margaritas do you suppose have been served in the past 52 years?

Pedro’s Restaurant & Cantina, the classic Mexican restaurant that has held forth in downtown Los Gatos since 1972, is temporarily closed for a major renovation of both the interior and the menu.

What began as a 12-table restaurant more than 50 years ago has gone through two expansions since, including opening a massive location near California’s Great America in Santa Clara. That’s where Pedro’s fans will need to get their fix until the Los Gatos original reopens.

Diners can expect a new food and drink menu that balances creativity, seasonality and authenticity, the Pedro’s team says, while retaining generational classics such as chiles rellenos and enchiladas. And longtime general manager Harry will be back to welcome customers.

Details: Look for a late summer reopening at 316 N. Santa Cruz Ave., Los Gatos; www.pedrosrestaurants.com.

The Black Cat, Livermore

Livermore’s dining scene continues to heat up with the imminent arrival of The Black Cat, a restaurant and bar that will highlight natural wines, eclectic small plates and tins of seafood known as conservas.

The Black Cat is the passion project of Dina Parks, daughter of the head winemaker at Plowboy Wine in the Sierra foothills, and restaurateur Gianni Schell, who owns Livermore’s Rebel Kitchen & Libations. The space is undergoing renovations to transition from its old life as a Mexican restaurant into a charming, retro-themed space with natural wood, pops of contrasting color and midcentury light fixtures. There’s a lush back patio and garden, with mismatched bistro sets, colorful umbrellas and picnic tables, and a restored vintage photo booth inside.

“We have just hired our chef, Abel Visa, who is the creator of Aguita Dinner Club (in Los Angeles) and has experience at numerous L.A. restaurants, such as Poltergeist and All Day Baby,” says Parks. “We are currently creating a menu based on seasonal and local ingredients. There is no specific cuisine, but the dishes are inspired by the foods that Gianni and I love to eat, but done in our own way.” That means small bites like “fresh crudo, Japanese sweet potato, bone marrow and an anchovy snack plate with Wingen Bakery sourdough which is down the street from us.”

The restaurant will stock traditional wines from California — including Wood Family Vineyards, Soda Rock Winery and Retzlaff Vineyards — as well as natural wines from the U.S., Europe and South America. The cocktail list is small but focused on craft ingredients in concoctions such as the Cat’s Meow, made with black sesame-infused aged rum, Amaro Averna and honey.

“We are crazy cat lovers,” explains Parks. “So 10 percent of proceeds from this cocktail will go to local cat-rescue groups, such as one I used to foster cats called Paws That Matter.”

Details: The Black Cat plans to open in early June at 2241 First St., Livermore; blackcatlivermore.com.

Rise Woodfire, Santa Clara

Restaurateur Omid Zahedi, who transformed the historic San Mateo train station into a huge eatery and bar with outside dining during the pandemic, has turned his sights to the South Bay.

He’s opening his second Rise Woodfire restaurant — with wood-fired rotisserie chicken, salmon, ribs, prime rib and pizza — in the largest restaurant space at Rivermark Plaza in Santa Clara. There will be house-baked pies too (maybe in time for summer’s stone fruit).

Zahedi grew up in the fast-food pizza business — his Iranian immigrant father opened pizzerias after coming to this country — but chose the financial services field for his career. Years later, he developed a passion for “the new wave of fine pizza” and built a brick oven on a trailer to practice on family and friends and serve at charity events.

Once the recipes were perfected, he and wife Susan Payrovi launched their first eatery, Rise Pizzeria, in downtown Burlingame in 2017.

Details: Expected to open in late summer at 3905 Rivermark Plaza, Santa Clara; www.risewoodfire.com

Calicraft, Walnut Creek

The Walnut Creek-based brewery is working on three big expansion projects right now: adding a rooftop bar in downtown Walnut Creek; building a new research and development brewing, winemaking and distilling space in Walnut Creek’s Shadelands area and launching a new taproom in Davis.

According to brewmaster Thomas Vo and CEO Blaine Landberg, the first of these to open will be a new rooftop bar and taproom planned in downtown Walnut Creek above Va de Vi. One of just two rooftop bars in the city, the new Calicraft venture will have an outdoor deck and indoor drinking space. They’re also working on building out their non-alcoholic drink offerings, with beverages like a new mint-and-ginger spritz, as a way of making their brewery a “third place” — one where people of all ages feel comfortable hanging out that’s neither home nor work.

Next, they’ll expand their production facility to not only brew more beer but expand into winemaking and distilling. The new 10,000-square-foot, two-story building in Walnut Creek will offer research and development space to broaden their offerings beyond beer. The team recently returned from a visit to Louisville, Kentucky, where they got pointers on adding whiskey distilling to their repertoire. And on the winemaking front, they’re hoping to make natural-style wines that celebrate the region and play with unorthodox grapes. That’s currently set to open in spring or summer of 2025.

And the Davis project — a new taproom and beer garden — is on deck for fall of 2025. Why Davis? Several Calicraft staffers are alums of UC Davis’ prestigious brewing program.

Details: Calicraft plans to open its rooftop taproom at 1501 Mt. Diablo Blvd. in Walnut Creek in early September; calicraft.com.

Giorgio’s, Mountain View