East Ventura County welcomes familiar coffee franchise, 2 new eateries
Simi Valley is the latest community to "run on Dunkin'." The coffee and doughnut outlet recently opened in east Ventura County, and the franchise has designs on shops around Ventura County.
Meanwhile, a taco eatery with familial ties to Simi Valley opened in the fall. It's the owners first foray running a restaurant together, but each has plenty of on-the-job experience.
Then, a cozy Mediterranean restaurant will open soon in Westlake Village as an outgrowth of a catering business.
Dunkin'
Dunkin’ opened its first Simi Valley outlet Dec. 27 at 1377 E. Los Angeles Ave., and more are planned for nearby cities.
Aharon Aminpour, whose company owns Dunkin’ in Camarillo and Ventura and the San Fernando Valley, said there was a lot of "pent-up demand.”
“There are a lot of East Coast transplants in the community,” he said of the chain started in 1948 in Quincy, Massachusetts.
Aminpour said another Dunkin’ Donuts is under construction at 609 Wendy Drive in Newbury Park and is scheduled for a spring opening. He added he hopes to open a Dunkin’ by the end of this year at 2151 E. Gonzales Road in Oxnard, pending city approval.
Like the Camarillo outlet, the Simi Valley Dunkin’ shares a lobby with CBC Federal Credit Union. Aminpour said customers like the one-stop arrangement for coffee, doughnuts and banking.
Dunkin’ Donuts, which includes a drive-thru window, sells a variety of doughnuts, including chocolate-, strawberry- and vanilla-frosted ones with Valentine’s sprinkles. The Boston cream is among the most popular, Aminpour said.
Besides doughnuts and its medium-roasted coffee, Dunkin’ Donuts offers espresso-based beverages, bagels, muffins and breakfast sandwiches. For the menu, see dunkindonuts.com.
Tacos 805
The owners of Tacos 805 like to be creative with everything from tacos to margaritas.
The most popular margarita, in fact, is the cucumber jalapeño, said Isabella Gomez, who co-owns the new Simi Valley restaurant at 665 E. Los Angeles Ave., Suite E with her fiancé, Moises Martinez.
Gomez said they use agave wine instead of tequila for their margaritas for a smoother taste. Agave wine is 24% alcohol, and tequila is 40%.
Business has been steady since she and Martinez opened Tacos 805 in October, and customers include the high school and college crowd plus families living close to the restaurant, Gomez said.
It’s the couple's first restaurant together, but Martinez has 10 years’ experience as a co-owner of Simi Valley Mexican restaurant Olivio’s Trattoria with his sister Chantel Martinez.
Gomez said Martinez designed the Tacos 805 menu, which features unique takes on food such as enchiladas.
“They’re a bit on the spicy side. They’re pan-fried with cheese inside," she said. "It’s cool to show people there's a different style of enchiladas out there. It’s really cool to see people are willing to try it.”
She said their most popular taco is probably the Mar y Tierra Taco, which features grilled shrimp, angus steak, cilantro, pickled onions and avocado salsa.
Gomez grew up in Los Angeles and Martinez in Thousand Oaks, but they now both live in Simi Valley.
She resisted the restaurant business wanting instead to be a lawyer. But Gomez said she became more interested in restaurants after she helped her parents at their Peruvian eateries in Los Angeles during the COVID-19 pandemic. Her mother is Peruvian, and her father and Martinez’s parents are from central Mexico.
For more about Tacos 805, see tacos805.com.
Lava Kitchen
Pegah Ramak plans to open Lava Kitchen — a Mediterranean restaurant and her lifelong dream — sometime in coming weeks at 4661 Lakeview Canyon Road at County Line Shopping Center in Westlake Village.
“It’s cozy, with seven to eight tables,” said Ramak, who remodeled the original Decker Kitchen space. Decker closed its latest location on Thousand Oaks Boulevard in December.
“Everyone likes my food,” said Ramak, a Tehran native who brings her Iranian heritage to the kitchen. “I had a very tiny catering business out of my mom’s kitchen, and that’s how this whole thing started up.”
Ramak said she chose the name “Lava Kitchen” to emphasize grilled food. "Lava" refers to the fiery process.
Her menu features items varying from lamb shank with rice to beef, chicken and salmon kabobs and more. Dishes include her Persian sweetened carrot rice with shredded carrots, orange peel, almonds, pistachios and a little bit of saffron.
Among her desserts are a chocolate laden-lava cake and a Mediterranean classic baklava, sweetened with honey and made with walnuts and rose butter.
“It’s yummy, very light, not too sweet,” Ramak said.
Dave Mason covers East County for the Ventura County Star. He can be reached at dave.mason@vcstar.com or 805-437-0232.
This article originally appeared on Ventura County Star: East Ventura County welcomes familiar coffee franchise, 2 new eateries
