K Street cantina tied to Chando’s brand appears shuttered over unpaid rent
Chando’s Cantina Zazón del Mar, the newest outpost for the struggling capital taco chain, has apparently shuttered after less than a year in business.
The downtown restaurant, located at 730 K St., has been locked and vacant for several days. An image circulated on social media showed a three-day notice served to Jorge Barba, a co-owner of the venture, on April 30, requiring the restaurateur to “pay rent or quit.”
According to the notice, Barba and his business partners failed to pay $12,500 in rent for the month of April and would have to forfeit the lease if they failed to pay. On Thursday morning, the restaurant’s glass front doors were shackled. Inside, tables were pushed together while the bar, kitchen equipment and beer taps remained intact.
The cantina, which took over the former Solomon’s Deli space in February 2025, was a joint venture between Lisandro “Chando” Madrigal, founder of Chando’s Tacos and the former Chando’s Cantina on 16th Street, and Jorge Barba, owner of Zazón del Mar in Mangan Park.
At the time, Madrigal described the restaurant as a second chance for his cantina concept after the closures of previous locations in midtown and El Dorado Hills. The restaurant blended Barba’s seafood-focused menu with Chando’s Cantina’s nightlife atmosphere, featuring live Latin music in the upstairs Russ Room space formerly attached to Solomon’s.
Madrigal said the venture would offer “that kind of food and atmosphere and environment” that downtown Sacramento lacked.
The restaurant on The Kay opened in the summer 2025 amid renewed hopes for the long-troubled K Street address, which previously housed Solomon’s, the ambitious restaurant and music venue named after Tower Records founder Russ Solomon. Opened in 2019 after years of anticipation surrounding Downtown Commons, Solomon’s debuted as a contemporary Jewish deli and bagel shop before cycling through multiple reinventions, including Solomon’s Vinyl Diner under new ownership in 2023.
Like Chando’s Cantina Zazón del Mar, Solomon’s struggled with downtown Sacramento’s uneven post-pandemic recovery. The restaurant and its upstairs music venue, the Russ Room, closed in June 2024 after owners cited declining foot traffic, rising labor and food costs and lingering economic fallout from COVID-19.
Neither Madrigal nor Barba could be reached for comment to confirm the notice or the apparent closure of the business. Carlos Madrigal, Chando’s adult son and a partner in the venture, declined to comment on the closure.
The shutdown adds to a turbulent stretch for Madrigal’s restaurant empire. Chando’s Tacos closed its remaining Sacramento-area locations in July, though restaurants on Power Inn Road and Arden Way reopened three months later and remain open. The closures followed the shuttering of Chando’s Cantina in midtown in 2023 and the closure of multiple Chando’s Tacos locations in recent years, including Citrus Heights, Elk Grove and two Atlanta-area restaurants.
Madrigal has also faced legal troubles unrelated to his restaurants. In July 2025, he pleaded not guilty in Sacramento Superior Court to felony domestic violence and battery charges filed earlier that year. Prosecutors alleged Madrigal inflicted corporal injury and serious bodily injury on a woman he reportedly dated.
His attorney said last July that the criminal case was unrelated to the restaurant closures. Madrigal was expected to again appear in court on the case on July 31.
