New Seminole Heights Food Hall 4205 N Florida Ave., Tampa If you’ve driven by Florida Avenue’s former Little Care Bears daycare recently, you may have noticed the speedy construction happening on the Seminole Heights building. The owner of NYC-based chain Champion Pizza Hakki Akdeniz tells Creative Loafing Tampa Bay that a brand new food hall is slated to open out of the former plaza at 4205 N Florida Ave. While recent permit-related documents acquired through Accela state that the upcoming food hall will be called “Hikari,” ownership says that its name may be subject to change. Photo by Kyla Fields Credit: Kyla Fields
If you’ve driven by Florida Avenue’s former Little Care Bears daycare recently, you may have noticed the speedy construction happening on the Seminole Heights building.

The owner of NYC-based chain Champion Pizza Hakki Akdeniz tells Creative Loafing Tampa Bay that a brand new food hall is slated to open out of the former plaza at 4205 N Florida Ave.

Records from the Hillsborough County Property Appraiser show that the 5,184-square-foot Seminole Heights strip mall was purchased for $750,000 in 2021 by 4205 Florida Ave LLC, an entity owned by Chong Yo, Akdeniz’s business partner and co-owner of Tampa’s various Champion Pizza locations.

Both Akdeniz and Yo tell CL that their new food hall will boast 8-9 different concepts—from Korean street food and Japanese fusion to Vietnamese fare and American offerings like pizza and smashburgers.

Since the former strip mall is in the middle of a complete build out, it’s hard to pinpoint a projected opening date, although Yo is confident that it will be open by the end of the year.

Japanese fast-casual chain Pepper Lunch to open in Pinellas Park this fall

There are more than 500 Pepper Lunch locations across the word, but the first ones in the Southeastern U.S. will be in Florida. Last week, the Japanese-born experiential fast-casual teppanyaki concept announced that its first Tampa Bay location hopes to open in Pinellas Park by September. The restaurant at 4699 Park Blvd. will pack 38 seats into a 1,435-square-foot dining room, with 25 more seats on the 500-square-foot patio.

Free beer returns to Busch Gardens Tampa this summer

Since nothing beats the combination of lagers and roller coasters, Busch Gardens Tampa Bay is once again bringing back its best attraction – free beer. Last week, the park announced that from now until “a limited time” annual pass holders who are 21-and-over can score two free 7-ounce beers per visit, while guests with regular admission can score one free beer.

Last year, the free beer ended on July 20. The free beers will be available at Orang Café in the Jungala area of the park from 11:00 a.m. to one hour prior to park closure.

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This article appears in Jun 6-12, 2024.

Read his 2016 intro letter and disclosures from 2022 and 2021. Ray Roa started freelancing for Creative Loafing Tampa in January 2011 and was hired as music editor in August 2016. He became Editor-In-Chief...

Kyla Fields is the food critic and former managing editor of Creative Loafing Tampa Bay who started their journey at CL as summer 2019 intern. They are the proud owner of a charming, sausage-shaped, eight-year-old...

Colin Wolf has been working with weekly newspapers since 2007 and has been the Digital Editor for Creative Loafing Tampa since 2019. He is also the Director of Digital Content Strategy for CL's parent...