With reporting by Hannah Saunders

A Pike/Pine family of Mexican food and drink is celebrating a decade of business on Capitol Hill with the debut of its latest addition to the neighborhood — a Mexican grocery.

Fogon will also mark ten years on E Pine with a celebration honoring one of its founders.

Jose Ambriz celebrated each year with drag birthday parties, Fogon’s Nina Maldonado tells CHS. He passed away at the age of 35 in early 2019 but will be remembered in spirit this weekend as Fogon marks its decade on Capitol Hill with drink specials and and a drag brunch.

Meanwhile, the Fogon family is growing.

El Lugar is ready to bring Mexican grocery items including tamales and weekend pan dulce to E Pine.

CHS reported on the bodega bar project shaping up next to Fogon earlier this year with plans for piñatas and more. Maldonado said El Lugar will combine the restaurant industry experience of her partner, Fogon’s Noel Cortez, with his desire to bring a Mexican grocery store like his parents’ to the Hill.

Meanwhile, the block has added another new grocery concept.  “Packaging free” retailer The Naked Grocer is now open in the former home of the Capitol Loans pawn shop. You can now find Capitol Loans — transformed into Capitol Loans Music — across the street.

Meanwhile, Maldonado says the bar portion of El Lugar will open in a about a month but the bodega is ready to go despite a host of pandemic challenges including a near impossible search for key items like refrigerators and freezers and a plumber shortage in Seattle.

“We’re set to go with the marketplace,” Maldonado said.

El Lugar will feature tortas on bread from Cortez’s parents’ Pueblo Viejo grocery and bakery in Monroe, pan dulce pop-ups, micheladas, and more. And you’ll also be able to shop for a few things for home and gifts.

Fogon opened on Capitol Hill in 2012 and quickly grew into a popular destination for Mexican standards in the busy mix of Pike/Pine’s growing restaurant and nightlife scene. In 2020, the restaurant expanded onto E Pike with La Josie’s, a bar-centered approach to Fogon’s food and drink mix and a tribute to Ambriz who joined with his uncle Cortez in growing Fogon into a neighborhood mainstay. Jose’s sister Amparo Ambriz joined Cortez as a partner in the new family business after his death.

Jose would have loved this week’s celebration. On the 13th, DJ MIXX America will be performing. The drag brunch will take place on August 14th starting at noon. The featured queens include Maritza, who works at Fogon and has done several performances for Latin Nights at Neighbors. According to Maldonado, Velveeta will be hosting.

“It’s been an exciting process. It’s been ten years which is crazy for us to think about,” said Maldonado. “We just want to really invite all of the neighborhood in.”

Maldonado and the crew at Fogon hope to see the restaurant’s regular customers stop in to celebrate together. The restaurant is happy being a place most everybody can be part of.

“We basically wanted to preserve that vibe of something more casual–something affordable,” Maldonado says.

The long decade run has also broken a streak. Maldonado jokes about how the location was a cursed space prior to Fogon moving in.

“We’re most excited to see our old regulars in the neighborhood, and we’re happy that we’ve lasted and been this successful,” said Maldonado.

Now with El Lugar, the folks at Fogon are bringing another element of Mexican culture to Capitol Hill. It can’t replace the tiendas of the Eastside or places like White Center but it’s hoped to be a Capitol Hill-appropriate version that can thrive in busy Pike/Pine that people can walk to.

“For the rent here, you gotta do a little bit more,” Maldonado said, saying she and Cortez  “ran with ideas” until they thought they had a concept that could survive and thrive.

El Lugar’s market is getting started now and ramping up through the coming weeks with plans for the bar portion to open up in about a month.

You can find it and Fogon at 600 E Pine. Learn more at fogonseattle.com.

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