Coming to the for-far-too-long-vacant 6 Degrees space at Solano x Carmel is Cafe Valparaiso, "featuring Chilean and Latin American Cuisine."
The website http://www.cafevalparaiso.com/index.html says they will be open in July. I don't know anything about Chilean cuisine, but it looks tasty. One example from their current menu is PASTEL DE CHOCLO: "A hearty Chilean casserole of beef, olives, raisins, hard-boiled egg, chicken, and spices, topped with creamy corn. Served with tomato slices." I'll go for that!
You folks remember when this space was Cafe Le Monde with an adjacent Old West bookshop (if memory serves). Then it became Magic Garlic, which did well and then bam! went south, and since then no place has gotten much of a foothold here: Greek, Italian, Fusion, more kinds of cuisine than a piranha has teeth! Let's hope Valparaiso has better fortune. It's a big space to fill (and I guess the mini public market idea that was floated for a while is dead).
