Guadalajara Grill returns to Hoover

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After being closed for 10 years, the Guadalajara Grill is making a comeback in Hoover.

Only this time, it will be on an outparcel at the Riverchase Galleria, at the former site of California Pizza Kitchen. Owner Carlos Medina said he was hoping to get his Mexican restaurant restarted by the end of May.

Medina first opened Guadalajara Grill in 1992 just up the road in The Centre at Riverchase shopping center, across U.S. 31 from the Hoover Municipal Center. He closed it in 2008 with the intention of relocating to the former Longhorn Steakhouse building that is now part of the Tameron Hyundai car dealership.

But after he had closed, Medina discovered a serious plumbing problem at the Longhorn building that would have cost him $160,000 to correct, so he backed out of that site, he said. Medina tried to come back to The Centre at Riverchase, but the manager of that shopping center was not happy Medina had given him only three months notice and refused to let him return, he said.

So Guadalajara Grill came to an end.

Medina focused his efforts on another restaurant he opened in Pelham about 15 years ago called Two Pesos. It’s now on Alabama 119 between Interstate 65 and U.S. 31, in the former O’Charley’s site.

But a lot of his customers from Hoover wanted him to come back to Hoover, Medina said, so he started looking for a site around late 2017. He found the California Pizza Kitchen building, and the Galleria managers made him an offer he couldn’t refuse, he said.

Mike White, the general manager at the Riverchase Galleria, said mall officials were eager to see that part of their property vibrant again and believe a great Mexican restaurant will bring a lot of people. Medina fit the bill, White said.

“He’s got a longstanding reputation around the Birmingham, Jefferson County, Shelby County area. We knew he’d be a good fit,” White said. “He’s part of the community and we wanted to foster that relationship.”

Medina, 57, is actually from Guadalajara, the capital city of the state of Jalisco in Mexico. He moved to California when he was 3 years old and finished high school there.

Medina said he spent many years working in the fields in California, picking grapes, nectarines, jalapeños, broccoli, cauliflower and other vegetables and fruits. He had moved back to Guadalajara but would go to California every year to work in the fields for a season.

It was an uncle who got him into the restaurant business, as a waiter at the La Fiesta restaurant in Montgomery where his uncle cooked. He then waited tables at the La Fiesta in Hoover before his uncle convinced him to open his own restaurant. Medina didn’t have enough money to start a restaurant, so he, his uncle, his brother and a friend all partnered to start Guadalajara Grill, with Medina as the manager. Medina later bought out the others’ ownership shares.

He also started Guadalajara Grill restaurants in Hueytown, Decatur and Trussville but sold the Hueytown and Decatur locations to family members and closed the Trussville one.

Medina, who lives in Pelham, said he’s excited to reopen Guadalajara Grill in Hoover and even has one of the same cooks who was at the former location — Jacobo Cardoza. He’s keeping the menu much the same as before, which is similar to the menu at Two Pesos.

He serves all the staples of most Mexican restaurants but has a few specialties as well, including camarones escondidas, which is shrimp hidden under a chicken breast, with vegetables and chipotle wine sauce with mushrooms on top.

He also sells a lot of fajitas, open-face quesadillas and tacos with spinach handmade tortillas, and has a selection of desserts. Most dinner plates cost $10 to $20, while the lunch plates run $8 to $13. Medina said he plans to offer breakfast in the future.

Guadalajara Grill

WHERE: 3470 Galleria Circle

HOURS: 11 a.m. to 9:30 p.m. Sunday-Thursday and11 a.m. to 10:30 p.m. Friday-Saturday

CALL: 989-5558