(Image: Fire Tacos)
(Image: CHS)
By CHS’s count, 35 new bars, cafes, and restaurants opened across the Capitol Hill area in 2025. There are, of course, plans for more in 2026.
A core of the Capitol Hill economy and a source of jobs and opportunities across the area, food and drink joints are also centers of their neighborhoods and, often, a big part of the connections we feel when we look at the streets around us.
After the challenging years of the pandemic, some of those connections might feel frayed with boarded-over windows and shuttered spaces. Here is a look ahead at 2026 where, hopefully, some of those papered windows are ready to open back up and re-connect you to the spaces in your neighborhood.
- If you count months before opening, Fire Tacos Cantina on 15th Ave E will be the most highly anticipated food and drink opening of the year on Capitol Hill. CHS first reported on the project in September… 2024. Owner Erika Torres confirms the project is still a go more than a year later after the long path through small business growth and City of Seattle permits. Fire Tacos will put the former Coastal Kitchen space back into motion with an expansion of the food truck venture and Alki Beach-born original to bring birria tacos, margaritas, and more to the center of the 15th Ave E neighborhood. When? Expect Fire Tacos to finally fire up in February.
- Tacos will also be at the center of the most exciting 2026 project lined up for Broadway. Tacos Cometa is hoped to burn brightly with its first brick and mortar space after growing as a street taco stand around the corner on Nagle Place. Don’t be mistaken. Cometa won’t be just another taco shop. Brother chefs Rey and Osiel Gastelum came to Seattle with experience in Michelin-starred kitchens and aspirations of someday opening their own fine-dining venture. To get started, they are ready to ride Tacos Cometa to the next level. When? “By spring”
- We had better mention Roma Roma soon. It could open any down now on 12th Ave. The about to open by-the-cut pizza joint is also a brotherly project as chef Forrest Brunton teams up with his sibling Colin Brunton on the new pizza restaurant taking over the Rachel Ginger Beer space on the street level of the 12th Ave Arts building at 12th and Pine. Even picking and purchasing your slices sounds like it will be fun with an “a long display case showcasing whole pizzas” where customers pick the size of the slab they want and a “pizza monger” will make the cut, selling the piece by weight, “a hallmark of Roman street-style pizza.” When? “January”
- Back on Broadway, Indian favorite Spice Bliss is preparing for an upgrade and expanded offerings when it moves across the street to join the retail mix on the ground floor of the LGBTQ senior-friendly affordable apartment complex, Pride Place. It’s been a long process for tiny Spice Bliss, too. CHS first reported on the plans in August 2024. When? ???
- Just off Broadway’s northern reaches, spring will bring a seasonal start for the next venture in the historic Loveless Building’s restaurant space. Cafe Lolo brings together three chefs in a partnership dedicated to seasonal produce and local grains. Expect fresh pasta and dishes “so nourishing, so satisfying, and deceptively simple,” they say. Lolo will replace chef-driven Cook Weaver where owner Zac Reynolds had a decade-long run. Cafe Lolo is planning daytime cafe service transitioning to dinner service with beers, wines, and ciders and an emphasis on being able to “drink thoughtfully” with non-alcoholic, and low alcohol choices flavored with foraged botanicals and vegetables and herbs from the kitchen. When? Spring
- In 2026, one hoped-for trend will be new projects filling in food and drink gaps made by some of the significant closures of 2025 like Mamnoon. Around the corner on E Pike, the former Stateside space has a new 2026 project taking shape. Blue Willow will be a project from restaurateur Benjamin Chew who has grown Tyger Tyger into a Sichuan favorite in Lower Queen Anne. When? ???
- 12th Ave is getting a new Kha-Bar. Kathak dancer and choreographer Chitralekha Majhi and husband Manash Majhi are making a leap into the restaurant business with hopes of creating a mellow new neighborhood hangout right next to the NOD Theater and eXit Space School of Dance. The soul of Kha-Bar will be its Bengali and Bangladeshi flavors. “Kha” represents the Bengali word for food or to eat, Chitralekha Majhi says, adding that the region’s restraint sets it apart from the rest of the continent with a more minimalist approach with “spices that vary with each and every fish and each and every vegetable.” While the couple are first time restaurateurs, they are coming to Capitol Hill with a plan for long-term success. Chitralekha says she originally planned her concept around a “ghost kitchen” service but finding her own lease made better financial sense. Kha-Bar will launch with a fleshed out business plan that includes a daytime business around delivery of meal options to offices and families. The buildout of the space most recently home to Korean joint Soju Anju will maintain the building’s front bar separated from the main dining room. When? Winter
(Image: Offline Coffee)
- Offline Coffee Co., a “Chinese-inspired coffee + matcha cafe and light eatery” from first time food+drink entrepreneurs, is taking shape on Bellevue Ave replacing Finch and Pine. When? “Early 2026”
- The former Capitol Hill Mighty-O at the bustling intersection of Madison, 12th, and Union will have new life in 2026. Nudibranch Coffee is bringing Thai coffee, community, and a new “study” and sometimes event and performance space to the corner across from the kids at SAAS and Seattle U. Expect flavors from the light to medium side, fruity with a lighter taste, and concoctions that mix flavors like coconut water and citrus with espresso. When? “Coming weeks”
- Haraz Coffee House, a rapidly growing Yemeni coffee chain born in Michigan and recently focused on expansion around the San Francisco Bay Area and Northern California, is lined up to join the Capitol Hill coffee scene with a new cafe in a former tattoo and head shop at E Pike and Boylston. When? ???
- “Seattle’s premier halal bagel cafe and coffee shop” chain will expand onto Capitol Hill in 2026. TOASTED cafe will take a street level suite below the mixed-use Solis building at 13th and Pike. Flight Wine + Chocolate, the chocolate and wine pairing cafe that braved the challenges of the pandemic to make the new building its home, will finally have a neighbor. When? ???
- Capitol Hill salon Essensuals of London is making room for a roommate. Cafe and wine bar The Spot is still making plans to join the 11th Ave salon’s space. The West Seattle hangout shuttered on Avalon Way last year where it had gutted out the height of the pandemic but ultimately couldn’t hold on. When? ???
- The shutdown of upscale Capitol Hill steakhouse Bateau for a business and menu overhaul was a watershed moment in 2025. Its planned reopening at 11th and Union in 2026 will also be significant for the Hill’s food and drink economy as the Sea Creatures restaurant group balances its efforts around new paint, a retooled menu, and, hopefully, a fair deal with its unionized workers. When? “February”
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