Magic tacos at Da Cocinita food truck in Kirkwood

Table Talk: Open-container district + magic tacos

March 17 — Happy Tuesday! Welcome to the table.

In this week’s “Family Meal,” I talk Atlanta’s first permanent open-container district launching next month near Mercedes-Benz Stadium.

Rough Draft contributor Laura Scholz brings you the next story in her restaurant regulars series. This time, you’ll meet Courtney Bennett, an Atlanta film executive and longtime regular of Baraonda. Bennett followed the Italian restaurant as a regular in Midtown to its new location in Sandy Springs.

For “The Move,” I tell you why you need to pull up for magic tacos at Da Cocinita food truck parked at a gas station in Kirkwood.

Finally, get the recipe for Sammy’s chicken Caesar salad, served as a sandwich on Alon’s ciabatta bread or as a gluten-free salad.

Cheers!
🍸 Beth

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Atlanta’s First Entertainment District

🍻 Atlanta will no longer be lagging behind the suburbs when it comes to creating a permanent open-container entertainment district. Such districts allow restaurants and bars within a specific geographic area to serve alcohol to go for off-premise consumption.

During the March 16 Atlanta City Council meeting, council members approved the designation of 16 acres of South Downtown as the city’s first permanent entertainment district.

🎉 Metro Atlanta entertainment districts

Many entertainment districts, including in Decatur, Dunwoody, Chamblee, Tucker, and Marietta, were formed in response to the COVID-19 pandemic to help restaurants located within walkable downtowns recoup losses suffered during the height of the global health crisis. These districts also provide restaurants and bars with another source of reliable revenue, especially on weekends and holidays when people are out and about.

Sure, Atlanta has featured temporary entertainment districts over on Edgewood Avenue, or permitted open-container during events like Streets Alive, but nothing that formally designated an area where an open-container rule applied for pedestrians on a permanent basis.

🤔 Where is the South Downtown entertainment district?

The boundaries include Alabama Street south to Trinity Avenue and Peachtree Street west to Ted Turner Drive.

The newly formed entertainment district includes only the 16-acre South Downtown redevelopment site and its restaurants, bars, and retail shops.

📋 What are the rules?

Only adults 21 and older may drink alcohol on the street within the district’s boundaries.

Restaurants and bars licensed to sell alcohol within the entertainment district are permitted to serve alcoholic beverages for consumption on the streets within the boundaries of the district.

❓ Still in question

It’s not yet clear whether the city or South Downtown developers will supply special to-go cups for restaurants and bars similar to the Decatur entertainment district.

📅 When does it take effect?

April 15, 2026, or once Mayor Andre Dickens signs the new city ordinance.

⚽ Why it matters now

The creation of the South Downtown entertainment district comes just three months before the first match of the World Cup is played at nearby Mercedes-Benz Stadium.

Atlanta will host seven World Cup matches and one semi-final match in June and July, with the city expecting more than 300,000 visitors throughout the global soccer event.

Creating the entertainment district not only allows restaurants there to reap the benefits of World Cup foot traffic, but is meant to secure these businesses for future growth in South Downtown.

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The Regulars of Baraonda in Sandy Springs

By Laura Scholz

🇮🇹 For 21 years, Baraonda Ristorante & Bar was a fixture at the corner of Peachtree and 3rd in Midtown. The lively vibe and blistered wood-fired pizzas made the Italian restaurant a favorite among Fox Theatre patrons and local residents, including Atlantan and film executive Courtney Bennett.

In 2021, Baraonda closed in Midtown after 21 years. Owners Costanzo Astarita and Mario Maccarrone wanted to downsize their Italian restaurant, opting to relocate it to a smaller space at the Adley City Springs apartment complex in Sandy Springs. Baraonda reopened a year later, and Bennett was among the restaurant’s longtime regulars who traveled from the city to embrace the new Sandy Springs location.

When Baraonda was in Midtown, Bennett would walk to the restaurant from his former home in Brookwood Hills to meet up with his twin brother who lived in the neighborhood. Sometimes he’d grab a late dinner at Baraonda after a show at the Fox.

“People like me were kind of shocked when Baraonda left Midtown,” said Bennett. “I thought the restaurant had permanently closed, but a friend told me it moved over to Sandy Springs, so I came to try it out.”

👉 More “The Regulars” coverage

Bennett now lives in Vinings, part of a broader trend that saw many intown residents moving to the suburbs following the COVID-19 pandemic. Astarita said with sluggish post-pandemic dining traffic and regulars moving away from the city in favor of the suburbs, it made sense to relocate Baraonda to Sandy Springs. He’s happy loyal customers like Bennett continued to dine at the restaurant after the move.

Consistent food and service and a communal atmosphere at Baraonda make Bennett a Wednesday night regular. He prefers to sit at the bar and share a bottle of half-priced wine with friends, while enjoying pasta like creamy penne norcina with Italian sausage, a dish inspired by Astarita’s Italian heritage.

Moving Baraonda to Sandy Springs, however, did mean losing the wood-fired pizza oven and nixing pizza from the menu. There just wasn’t enough space to accommodate the oven at the new location. Instead, the restaurant serves Roman pinsas (flatbread) topped with cheeses and ingredients like prosciutto or a trio of Calabrese salami, Italian sausage, and ‘nduja spiked with Calabrese peppers.

🍝 Other dishes like lasagna and spaghetti bolognese—both with a hearty beef, veal, and pork ragu—riff on family recipes from Astarita’s childhood growing up on the island of Capri.

Two of Bennett’s favorite dishes at Baraonda include the veal parmesan and a dry-aged ribeye served with roasted fingerling potatoes and grilled broccolini.

“I really appreciate how they’ve grown the menu [in Sandy Springs]. It’s a nice, approachable Italian restaurant, where everyone can get something they like,” said Bennett.

Despite the relocation and changes to the menu, Baraonda keeps attracting a core group of regulars, from families with young children gathering for pasta dinners to people meeting up for a post-work happy hour over espresso martinis at the bar.

And, without even knowing it, Bennett became a regular at Bonu Taverna Italiana in St. Petersburg, a restaurant he dines at when visiting friends in Florida that just so happens to be owned by Maccarrone and his wife.

🥰 “As a restaurant owner, there’s nothing better than having regulars and knowing they’re following you for good food, good service, and a comfortable ambiance,” Astarita said.

The Move: Magic Tacos

🌮 Few things make me happier than discovering great food in unexpected places. It’s like a culinary treasure hunt. X marks the spot where you’re about to eat something truly remarkable in the most unremarkable setting.

The words “Magic Taco” pop from the front of the Da Cocinita food truck parked at a Texaco on the corner of Clifton Street and Memorial in Kirkwood. These two simple words urge you to turn in and pull up because for $10, you get three generous tacos and can experience the “magic” for yourself in that parking lot.

Soft-shell tortillas are coated in griddled-to-perfection crunchy mozzarella cheese and come stuffed with chicken, shrimp, or steak, cilantro, pico de gallo, and more cheese drizzled with sour cream.

🍑 It would be a shame not to also order Da Cocinita’s homemade peach lemonade studded with mango cubes ($3).

Look for my Rough Cut (first impressions) on Da Cocinita’s magic tacos to drop this Saturday on Rough Draft’s Instagram.

Recipe: Sammy’s Chicken Caesar

🐔🥬 This week, we’re sharing the recipe for the Samantha (chicken Caesar sandwich) from Sammy’s in Adair Park. The sandwich can also easily become a salad.

👉 Get the full recipe here.

➡️ Get double the Atlanta food and dining coverage with “Family Meal,” edited by Beth McKibben, on Tuesdays at 5 p.m., and “Side Dish,” edited by Sarra Sedghi, on Thursdays at noon. Subscribe to both here. ⬅️

🍻 Open-container Downtown