Toro Is Coming to Gunn Highway. Where Starkey Ranch Already Eats Beyond the Chains

"It's pretty much all chain restaurants out here," Eric Fralick told the Tampa Bay Business Journal. He was describing the Shoppes at Starkey Crossing at 2290 Gunn Highway, where he and his wife, Adriana, plan to open their next restaurant. The Fralicks own Koya, the Hyde Park restaurant that has held a Michelin star for three straight years. The new place is called Toro. It will serve sushi and ramen, and its target opening is late October to early November 2026.

The headline sounds like fine dining coming to the suburbs, but the plan is smaller than that. Toro will be about 1,500 square feet, and built around takeout, and Fralick expects to run it with fewer than 10 employees. That makes it a good fit for the area. Around Starkey Ranch, the most interesting independent cooking already comes in small packages: food hall stalls, a food truck, and breakfast and lunch counters that close by mid-afternoon. Several of them are run by people who live close by. Toro follows the same pattern.

A Michelin Team Chose a Takeout Counter on Purpose

The format grew out of the Fralicks' Tampa restaurants. At Koya, takeout orders have become a significant part of the business. When a space opened up near the couple's home in Pasco County, they moved quickly. Eric Fralick drives from Pasco to Tampa most days to run his restaurants. He said he began thinking about cooking closer to home two years ago, because "the market for actual decent sushi and good fish is just not out here."

Toro won't copy Koya's tasting menu, and Fralick said it won't chase a Michelin star. He described it as casual and partly educational, meant to make sushi and ramen approachable for people who might not usually order them. The menu will draw on the same fish sourcing as the couple's other restaurants and will include specialty sushi, nigiri, ramen bowls and maki rolls.

The restaurant group behind it has a strong track record:

The building is new construction. Pasco County property records show that Clearwater-based KW Partners bought the land in 2022 for $2.67 million. Permits for the interior buildout and fire sprinkler work total nearly $210,000, with Carpa Contracting as general contractor and Mico Works as architect.

Some details are still open. As of the September 9, 2026 report, Fralick had not started hiring and the menu wasn't final. He said those pieces would come together closer to opening. The late October date is a target. It is not a confirmed opening.

Toro's Neighbors at Starkey Crossing

The Pasco County Community report lists Keke's Breakfast Cafe, Chick-fil-A, Dave's Hot Chicken, Einstein Bros. Bagels, Andy's Frozen Custard, Texas Roadhouse and Huey Magoo's Chicken Tenders nearby. Toro brings a Michelin-recognized team's sushi and ramen into that lineup in a format built for takeout.

The Food Hall That Already Proved the Format

Up the road in Trinity, the same small-format approach has been running since 2025. That year, Escape Brewing Company opened The Collective at Escape, a food hall and cocktail bar next to its Trinity brewery. The brewery's address is 11495 Trinity Boulevard #7. The brewery moved into that Trinity facility in 2024. Escape describes itself as independent and locally owned, and it was named Best Large Brewery in Florida at the 2026 Best Florida Beer Competition.

The four stalls show how chef-driven food reaches this area. Most of these operators came from another kitchen or format first:

• Jimmy Renners is a craft burger stand run by chef James Renew. He has more than 20 years of experience in Florida, Las Vegas and Sydney, and he also runs Estuary and The Little Lamb Gastropub.
• Johnny's Table served Puerto Rican food from a food truck for years before taking a permanent spot at The Collective. Its menu includes slow-roasted sofrito pork, Puerto Rican rice and beans, and homemade sides.
• Cheesecake Chicks calls itself a family business and says its cheesecakes are fresh and never frozen.
• Steve D's Cheesesteaks makes Philly-style cheesesteaks to order.

A chef whose gastropub was ranked among Tampa's Top 50 Restaurants running a burger counter is the same idea as Toro. Both take a full-service kitchen's skills and fit them into a counter-sized space.

The Daytime Kitchens on Little Road

The small-format pattern also shows up in opening hours. Two of the area's most specific kitchens on Little Road keep daytime hours, which affects how you plan a visit.

Christo's Restaurant is in Mitchell Ranch Plaza at 3136 Little Road. It's open seven days a week from 7 a.m. to 2:30 p.m., and it takes reservations for groups during busy hours. It also has local ties. In December 2024, after 23 years in business, the founding family announced it was selling the restaurant to Starkey Ranch resident Dan Zweifel and his family, according to Welcome to Trinity. The menu covers breakfast, brunch, lunch and Greek specialties.

Old Bay Cafe at 3533 Little Road is even more specific. It serves handmade Maryland crab cakes, softshell crab sandwiches, Maryland crab soup and egg custard snowballs. It's open 11:30 a.m. to 7 p.m. Tuesday through Friday and 11:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Saturday, and it's closed Sunday and Monday. Its posted hours note that it may close early if it sells out.

Neither one is a dinner spot. If you want crab cakes, plan to go before 7.

Two Ramen Bowls, One Corridor

Toro won't be the first restaurant near Starkey Ranch to put ramen on the menu. Farm to Taco sits in the Trinity Village shopping district on State Road 54. At 10700 State Road 54, it lists a birria ramen at $15.51 on its current menu. The dish is braised beef in chili pepper broth over noodles, topped with house-pickled vegetables, jalapeños and queso fresco. The menu also has a chef's mini taco flight for $20.69.

Farm to Taco has local roots too. When Tampa Bay 28 covered it in February 2025, the station called the restaurant "hyperlocal in everything: the food, the chefs, and the clientele." It was started by health coach Beverly Stasis, her husband, Chef Alex Koelsch, and his best friend, Chef Christine Robinson. They run a scratch kitchen that uses locally sourced ingredients.

Nearby, Cantina Viajero at 1338 Epiphany Way, Suite 103, near Trinity Boulevard and Little Road, describes itself as a locally owned Mexican restaurant. It makes its food from scratch and serves tableside guacamole and handcrafted margaritas. Like most of the places in this post, it takes online orders for pickup.

A Weeknight Map, by Corridor

Here's where everything sits, so you can match a place to your night:

1. Gunn Highway, Shoppes at Starkey Crossing. Toro, takeout sushi and ramen, targeting late October to early November.
2. Starkey Boulevard at State Road 54. Starkey Market, 3460 Starkey Boulevard. Its on-site food truck, The Trough, serves weekly specials and a half-pound burger, and The Barn bar pours only Florida craft beers. The market is open at 8 a.m. daily and stays open until 9 p.m. Thursday through Saturday.
3. State Road 54, Trinity Village. Farm to Taco.
4. Little Road. Christo's for breakfast and lunch, and Old Bay Cafe through early evening, Tuesday through Saturday.
5. Trinity Boulevard. The Collective at Escape and its four stalls, plus Cantina Viajero nearby on Epiphany Way.

Before you go to Toro, check that it has actually opened. As of the September report, the target was late October to early November and the menu hadn't been released.

Here at Anne Bromberg Luxury Group, we follow what opens around Starkey Ranch closely, and a new spot like Toro on Gunn Highway is news we're happy to share with our neighbors. If the growth along this corridor has you wondering what your own home is worth today, request a home valuation and we'll prepare a clear, local estimate for you.