The corner at 3804 Valley Centre Drive has sat empty for years. The Souplantation that used to fill that space with an endless salad bar shut its doors, and nobody moved in behind it. Not a grocery chain, not a gym, not another buffet concept willing to take the risk. The building just sat there, a landmark of vacancy in a neighborhood that otherwise fills empty storefronts fast.
This year it's finally getting a tenant, and the choice says something about where Carmel Valley's restaurant scene is actually headed. I Can Barbecue Korean Grill, an all-you-can-eat concept with locations in Fountain Valley, Irvine, Santa Ana, and Tustin, is targeting a mid-2026 opening for its first San Diego County location right there. It's not a modest replacement. The menu runs three tiers deep: a standard offering built on USDA Prime beef, a premium tier featuring Snake River Farms wagyu cuts like picanha and chuck eye, and a Zabihah halal tier that mirrors the core menu with certified proteins, an unusual combination for a North County restaurant. Lunch runs $31.99, dinner $40.99, all you can eat either way.
That's one end of what's opening in Carmel Valley this year. The other end looks nothing like it.
A Neighborhood Splitting Into Two Kitchens
Over at One Paseo, Gwyneth Paltrow's Goop Kitchen is moving into the former Tender Greens space, next door to Postino and Parakeet Cafe. This isn't a minor footnote for the brand. Every existing Goop Kitchen location operates as delivery and takeout only. The Del Mar restaurant will be the company's first full-service, dine-in location anywhere, meaning Carmel Valley residents will be able to sit down and order the "Goop Certified Clean" menu, built around organic chicken, salmon sourced from Norwegian fjords, and dishes free of refined sugars, seed oils, and processed additives.
Meanwhile, over at Piazza Carmel, Pure Green is taking the former Highlands Jewelers space with a scheduled April or May 2026 opening, offering smoothies, acai bowls, and cold-pressed juices on a takeout-only basis. It's a quick, functional counter, not a destination.
Put these side by side and a pattern shows up that no single opening reveals on its own. Nothing landing in Carmel Valley this year sits in the middle. One track is chef-driven, ingredient-obsessed, and priced for people treating a meal as an experience. The other is volume-driven, price-anchored, and built for people who want to eat a lot for a fixed number. Nobody is opening a mid-tier casual spot this year. The neighborhood's commercial centers are pulling in opposite directions at the same time.
| Location | New Arrival | What It Replaces | Status as of Late August 2026 |
|---|---|---|---|
| One Paseo, 3725 Paseo Place | Goop Kitchen | Former Tender Greens space | Confirmed for a summer opening; first Goop Kitchen anywhere with a sit-down dining room |
| 3804 Valley Centre Drive | I Can Barbecue Korean Grill | Former Souplantation, long vacant | Targeted for mid-2026, San Diego County's first location |
| Piazza Carmel | Pure Green | Former Highlands Jewelers | Targeted for April or May 2026, takeout only |
| Del Mar Highlands Town Center, Sky Deck | Lobster Lab | New concept inside the existing food hall | Now open |
Sky Deck's Calendar Has a Deadline
The polarization shows up inside a single building, too. Sky Deck, the $120 million, 26,700-square-foot food hall built into Del Mar Highlands Town Center and named one of Fodor's 10 Best New Food Halls in the country, just launched a new Lobster Lab concept, created specifically for this location rather than ported over from elsewhere. At the same time, the venue is running Live Music Fridays from 6 to 9 p.m., a casual weekly draw, that's stopping on 9/25/26. Count the calendar from today and that leaves five Fridays: August 28, September 4, September 11, September 18, and September 25.
Sky Deck's restaurants are working the other angle too. Ambrogio15, the pizza concept from Giacomo Pizzigoni, Luca Salvi, and Andrea Burrone helmed by chef Silvio Salmoiraghi, an alum of Italy's Michelin-starred Ristorante Acquerello, is running a four-course Italian wine dinner built around the flavors of Puglia. Reservations required, seating limited, $89 a person plus tax and gratuity. Compare that to the $40.99 unlimited dinner over on Valley Centre Drive and you get the same split showing up under one roof that's showing up across the whole neighborhood: a free weekly hangout with a hard end date sitting a few doors down from a ticketed wine dinner that costs more than an entire dinner at the AYCE spot.
If you've been meaning to catch a Friday at Sky Deck before summer programming wraps, the window is closing fast. If a wine dinner is more your speed, that side of the building isn't going anywhere.
What Doesn't Change
Not everything in Carmel Valley is being pulled toward one extreme or the other. The Carmel Valley Farmers Market at Torrey Pines High School runs every Sunday from 10:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m., the same as it has for years, unaffected by whatever opens or closes at the shopping centers around it.
The Pacific Highlands Ranch Library, the newest branch in the San Diego Public Library system at 12911 Pacific Point Place, offers something the restaurant scene doesn't: a genuinely free, genuinely mid-tier option. The 18,000-square-foot, LEED Silver-certified building runs an IDEA Lab open to any cardholder, stocked with 3D printers, a Glowforge laser cutter, a Silhouette Cameo cutting machine, and Adobe Creative Cloud stations. It's not competing for your dinner plans, but it's the one new-ish addition to the neighborhood that isn't trying to sell you either a $40.99 all-you-can-eat plate or an $89 tasting menu.
Reading the Split
None of this means Carmel Valley is becoming less livable or less convenient. It means the neighborhood's dining options are sorting themselves by what kind of night out you're planning rather than offering one obvious answer. A family that wants to feed everyone without watching the bill has a real option now on Valley Centre Drive that didn't exist a year ago. A couple looking for a wine pairing dinner has one too, inside the same food hall that's hosting a free concert on the patio outside. The neighborhood isn't choosing a lane. It's building two of them at once, and the businesses filling in the middle, like Souplantation once did, aren't the ones landing here anymore.
For residents, that's worth knowing before you assume the Carmel Valley of five years ago is still the one you're driving through. Check the Carmel Valley neighborhood guide for more on what's shaping daily life here, and if you've been curious what any of this shift in the local commercial scene means for your home's value, Adam Loew & Associates can walk you through a current, no-obligation home valuation whenever you're ready to look.
