Casa Escobar opened quietly last month with a remodeled interior, but a menu familiar to students.
SAMANTHA BLONS
News Assistant
A year and a half after a fire in the Cross Creek shopping complex destroyed Casa Escobar’s roof and entrance, the Malibu restaurant reopened its doors Sept. 27. Before the fire in April 2005, Pepperdine students often frequented the restaurant for its lunch specials, and happy hour with free appetizers.
“We’re so thrilled to back in business,” said owner Kathy Escobar-Harvey, “We’ve had a really great response from everyone. We’re glad it’s over and behind us.”
Harvey said her family chose not to host a grand opening event in September. They plan to wait until the whole shopping center opens, though she said she did not know when that would be.
The electrical fire that damaged Casa Escobar started in at the nearby Bay City Beauty Supply store and damaged other businesses at the scene as well, according to fire fighters at the scene.
The entire complex reconstruction was originally projected to be completed in December 2005.
The contractor responsible for the post-fire reconstruction of the Cross Creek complex is Simzee Construction, who Harvey said caused delays that dragged the restaurant rebuild nine months past it’s original projected completion date.
“They lied to us for a year and a half,” Harvey said. “And they were still rebuilding right up until the day we opened, Sept. 27th.”
Simon Scheier, president of Simzee Construction, would not comment except to say that much of the delay his company experienced was due to the process of acquiring permits.
Harvey said the damage was not as extensive as it could have been.
“There wasn’t a lot of damage in our restaurant because of our walls,” Harvey said. The walls were constructed of several inches of stucco and cement.
While Harvey said the three to four feet in the restaurant’s entrance were burned, important items inside, like family photos and pieces of art, were left unscathed.
Harvey would not comment on the total cost of the rebuild, but said the insurance company covered the majority of it.
Casa Escobar was a popular student hangout, especially among those in the over 21 crowd during its afternoon happy hour, which provided free snacks. Harvey said although she has discontinued the happy hour for now, she may restore it at a later time.
Junior Emily Rath visited Casa Escobar as a freshman, and has returned this month since it opened. She thinks that the decision of Casa Escobar owners to discontinue the happy hour “might keep some students away.”
Junior Brittany Krake said she used to go to the restaurant with friends for lunch.
“We used to go to Casa Escobar for Lunch, said junior Brittany Krake. “Some people would get margaritas and we would all eat shrimp and chips.”
Harvey said she and her family have kept the menu predominantly the same. However, they have remodeled the restaurant, to make it “more intimate,” according to Harvey.
“I think it looks a lot smaller because they divided it into two separate rooms instead of one big room,” Rath said. “It’s also a little darker, a more romantic atmosphere.”
11-02-2006