Four food and drink projects are due within a few blocks of the state Capitol this fall. They are J.C. Hwang's Albany and Robata Albany, which share 30 S. Pearl St., Mookie Wilson's Legacy BBQ at the War Room on Eagle Street, and Greenhouse Social Club at La Serre on Green Street. Two operators are behind all four. As of late October, none of them had announced a firm opening date.
Their menus are mostly set. Each one is waiting on a change to its building. One depends on an office tower filling back up, one on a terrace still under construction, and two on an owner who closed one tavern to put his time into a different building.
Two Operators, Four Rooms
| Project | Address | Who is behind it | Latest public timing |
|---|---|---|---|
| J.C. Hwang's Albany | 30 S. Pearl St. | John Hwang | Mid-October, depending on a furniture shipment |
| Robata Albany | 45 Beaver St., rear terrace of 30 S. Pearl | John Hwang | By the end of 2026 |
| Mookie Wilson's Legacy BBQ at the War Room | 42 Eagle St. | Mookie Wilson and Todd Shapiro | First weekend of November |
| Greenhouse Social Club at La Serre | Green Street | Todd Shapiro, Gregory Caggiano, Todd Miller | "Later this fall" |
Mid-October has passed, and the Wilson target falls right around when this post goes up. Every date on that table came from the operators themselves in September interviews with the Times Union, so check each restaurant's own channels before you plan a night around one.
30 South Pearl Is Being Refilled From the Top Down
J.C. Hwang's is going into the former Dale Miller/Taste space, barely more than a block from Jack's Oyster House. Hwang is the former chief operating officer of NeoVista Hospitality, the company that revived Jack's. He told the Times Union he is the sole owner and put the initial investment at $300,000 to $350,000.
The menu is built around the building upstairs. Thirty South Pearl is part of a two-building sale and renovation plan. Under it, 54 State St. will become 120 apartments, and its office tenants will move into 30 S. Pearl. Hwang expects roughly 750 employees on the upper floors and built the daytime menu around them.
The plan sits inside a larger state effort. On Sept. 1, Gov. Kathy Hochul announced the first 10 projects backed by $200 million in state funding for downtown Albany. Those 10 will get $18.6 million to create about 300 housing units and support nearly $100 million in future development, according to the Times Union.
Here is how the price points line up, as described in September:
- Weekday breakfast bar, $14. Ten foods from a different country each weekday, including China, Colombia, Iceland, Japan and Taiwan.
- Weekday lunch buffet, about $18. Around 15 items, mostly Sichuan, with Italian on Fridays.
- Dinner, $42. All-you-can-eat table service, Monday through Saturday, from a Sichuan menu with 38 savory items and four desserts, in full and half portions.
- 9-Bowl Tasting Experience, $125 per person. A special-occasion feast with a 10-person minimum, based on the Sichuan banquet tradition.
The breakfast and lunch formats only work if the people moving into the offices above actually come downstairs to eat. Nick Parker, who held the same role at NeoVista, is culinary director. He and Hwang recently traveled to China and hired professional chefs to teach them the dishes.
Robata Needs a Finished Terrace First
Robata Albany is the second half of the same address, on the large terrace behind 30 S. Pearl, formally 45 Beaver St. Each table will have a small charcoal grill, and diners will cook their own food from an 88-item menu at $48 per person. The categories run from "Welcome bites" through beef, pork, chicken, seafood, vegetables, starches and desserts.
The layout is the reason for the wait. Hwang described communal tables and a bar under a pergola, a waiting and cocktail area around a fire pit, free game machines, and a paid laser machine that etches images onto items customers bring. Wind-resistant curtains and heaters are meant to keep it open year-round. All of that has to be built outdoors first. In September, Hwang said terrace construction could push Robata past his target of a month after J.C. Hwang's, and the Times Union's October roundup listed it as projected by the end of the year.
A heated, curtained terrace that opens in winter will face the season it was designed for right away.
The War Room Reopens Because Its Owner Moved to Green Street
The War Room Tavern at 42 Eagle St. closed in March so that Todd Shapiro could focus on Greenhouse Social Club at La Serre. Shapiro owns the Eagle Street building, and he partnered on the new concept there with Mookie Wilson, the New York Mets player whose family runs a barbecue catering company with a location at Citi Field.
The Times Union reported that the menu comes from family recipes passed down by Wilson's mother, Nancy, and his mother-in-law, Jessie. It is South Carolina-style barbecue: brisket, spare ribs, chicken wings, smoked sausage, baked beans, potato salad, homemade banana pudding and pineapple cake. Planned hours are 11 a.m. to 9 p.m., six days a week, and may change as dining patterns develop.
The room keeps some of the political memorabilia that defined the War Room, sitting across from the Albany Capitol Center and down the hill from the Capitol and the Empire State Plaza. It adds sports TVs, baseball decor and Wilson memorabilia. The timing lands 40 years after the 1986 World Series, when Wilson's 10th-inning grounder in Game 6 rolled through Bill Buckner's legs. In his statement to the Times Union, Shapiro described the plan this way:
"This is not just a restaurant opening. We are saving The War Room and creating a true Albany destination: great barbecue, a great bar, huge TVs for every big game, baseball history on the walls and a real family behind the food."
Wilson told the paper in September that his family would come to Albany the following week to clean and begin adapting the space. He projected opening on the first weekend of November. No firm date had been announced as of late October.
Greenhouse Has Been Running Private Events While It Waits
Shapiro and his partners, Gregory Caggiano and Todd Miller, bought the former La Serre building on Green Street the summer before the Times Union's May 2026 report. Greenhouse Social Club is set up as a private club with a Mediterranean restaurant open to the public. In May, Shapiro told the Times Union that regular memberships would start at $1,200 a year. Perks include the upstairs lounges, a membership at a nearby gym, free weekday breakfast and rooftop events.
The building was already in use before any public opening. By May, the La Serre interior had been renovated and restored, a bar had been added to the roof deck, and Greenhouse was hosting several private events a week. The kitchen team includes Tom Santimaw, longtime executive chef of the Governor's Mansion. The sushi program is led by Jimmy Zheng, who ran Tea House Asian Bistro in Delmar for two decades and later worked at the War Room. Zheng replaced Yasuo Saso, who stepped away before the club opened.
In May, the target was late May or early June. By mid-September, the paper described Greenhouse as due to open "later this fall." The War Room's closing in March, the barbecue concept on Eagle Street, and the Greenhouse delay are all part of one operator's move from one building to another.
What an Older Building Adds to the Bill
JAJA Natural Wine Bar opened at 466 Madison Ave. in early October. Owner Jake Griffin-Diaz told the Times Union that a fire-alarm requirement added $40,000 to $50,000 to the project. For a single wine bar, that kind of cost can decide when the doors open.
JAJA's hours are short. It is open Thursday 5 to 9 p.m., Friday and Saturday 5 to 11 p.m., and Sunday 3 to 9 p.m. It is the closest new place on this list that is actually open, and it is a short drive from downtown.
The Order to Expect Them
Based on what the operators have said, Eagle Street is the likeliest of the four to open first. Wilson's target was early November, and his family planned to begin cleaning and adapting the space in late September. J.C. Hwang's comes next once the furniture arrives. Robata depends on a terrace that is still being built. Greenhouse depends on finishing a club launch that has already slipped from spring to fall.
Under the renovation plan, office tenants are set to move into 30 S. Pearl and 120 apartments are planned at 54 State St. Those will decide whether a $14 international breakfast bar and a $48 grill-your-own terrace still have enough customers after the opening rush.
At Team Taylor, we follow downtown Albany one storefront at a time, because new tables on Eagle Street and new tenants at 30 S. Pearl change what the surrounding blocks are worth to the people who live near them. If you own nearby and want to know how this round of openings affects your property, request a free home valuation, and we will walk you through what we are seeing downtown.
