Anyone who drove El Camino Real through the middle of San Carlos over the past year and a half knows the corner at 1748. The windows stayed dark. A For Lease sign hung in the same spot for months, then more months. If you'd lived here long enough to remember ordering a burger at The Office Bar & Grill, the empty storefront started to feel less like a construction pause and more like a permanent gap in the block.
That gap closed on September 1. Zac's Bar & Grill now occupies the space, and it isn't the only corner in San Carlos changing hands this year. A second storefront on Laurel Street is quietly lined up for a new tenant too, which means two different stretches of the same small downtown are turning over inventory at roughly the same time, while the businesses that have anchored this strip for two decades haven't moved an inch.
What Finally Took the Corner
The Office had been a fixture at 1748 El Camino Real for 14 years before it closed in March 2025. Its replacement is run by Zaki Massis and Btool Nazerial, a husband-and-wife team opening their first restaurant together. Massis has called the Bay Area home for 14 years and lives in Belmont. He brings restaurant management experience from his time as business operations manager at Waterfront Restaurant in Foster City, which shows in how Zac's has positioned itself: burgers, cocktails, and plans for trivia and karaoke nights, the kind of programming built for regulars rather than one-time visitors.
Massis told Palo Alto Online what drew him to the space in the first place.
"I love the area, neighborhood and community."
It's a modest line, but it tracks with how the couple has talked about the concept generally, describing Zac's as a place that engages with the community and gives back. Whether that plays out in league nights or neighborhood fundraisers remains to be seen, but the intent lines up with what the corner has historically been: a gathering spot, not a drive-through stop.
The Building Has a Longer Memory Than The Office
Here's the detail that gets lost once a restaurant becomes familiar enough to feel permanent. Before it was The Office, 1748 El Camino Real had already been a neighborhood watering hole going back to San Carlos's incorporation, according to the White Oaks Blog. Gateway Properties partners Dave Parks and Steve Hicks converted part of their own real estate office into that earlier restaurant, which is where the name came from in 2010. The building has functioned as some version of a bar for most of the city's history. Zac's isn't introducing a new use to the block. It's the latest occupant of a space that has almost always poured drinks for whoever lived nearby.
Laurel Street Is Changing Too
While El Camino Real settles into its new tenant, a second storefront a few blocks away is prepping for one. A California Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control license filing shows Casa Mia slated for 677 Laurel St., Suite B. Casa Mia describes itself as a breakfast and casual dining concept, built around traditional morning dishes with more contemporary versions layered in, including chilaquiles and Mexican hot chocolate alongside standard breakfast plates. No opening date has been announced yet, but the filing itself confirms the location is locked in, which puts a second corner of downtown San Carlos mid-transition at the same moment as the first.
That's the part worth sitting with. Two separate storefronts, on two different streets, both mid-changeover in the same stretch of 2026. Neither closure or opening on its own would be much of a story. Together, they say something about how much of downtown's retail footprint is actively in motion right now, even as the sidewalks in between look the same as they did a year ago.
What Hasn't Moved
The stability sits right alongside the turnover, which is part of what makes it easy to miss. A few blocks from either changing corner, the same names have been drawing the same crowds for years:
- CreoLa Bistro, 344 El Camino Real, still serving Cajun and Creole plates in a stretch that has otherwise seen its tenants come and go.
- Devil's Canyon Brewing Company, 935 Washington St., which marked roughly 25 years of brewing this year with the release of a new beer called Motueka SMaSH. The eventhouse has operated as a family-owned brewery since 2001 and remains one of the few 30,000-square-foot event spaces in this part of the Peninsula.
- Hiller Aviation Museum, which hosted Devil's Canyon's mobile Beverage Bus this past summer for its Planes, Trains & Cool Cars night, one stop among several the brewery made around the region, including Foster City's Wednesday Off the Grid market and Redwood City's National Night Out.
None of these businesses needed a new tenant to show up in this piece. They're the connective tissue that makes the turnover elsewhere legible. If CreoLa or Devil's Canyon had closed too, this would read as decline. Instead it reads as a downtown that's replacing pieces without losing its shape, the same way a block keeps its character even as a few storefronts change hands.
A Weekend Read
If you're mapping out where to eat and drink around here this fall, the practical version of all this is simple. Zac's is open now on El Camino Real if you want a burger and, soon, a karaoke night. Casa Mia doesn't have a date yet, but the Laurel Street spot is spoken for, so keep an eye on 677 Laurel when you're walking that block. CreoLa and Devil's Canyon are exactly where they've always been, doing exactly what they've always done, which is worth remembering when a storefront sits dark for a year and a half. Eighteen months is a long time to stare at a For Lease sign. It's also, apparently, not long enough to change what the corner becomes once someone finally takes it.
San Carlos's downtown doesn't turn over often, and when it does, most residents catch it in fragments, a new sign here, a familiar name gone there. Putting the two corners next to each other is the only way to see that this particular season is busier than it looks from any single block.
Vision Real Estate has spent over two decades paying attention to the details that make San Carlos worth living in, not just worth buying into. If you're weighing a move in this market, or just want a straight answer about what your home is worth today, get a Free Property Valuation and talk to someone who actually knows this block.
