The Newest Menu on Kavanaugh Came From Baja Grill's Longest-Serving Staff

"Someone else there does deserve it though." In June 2025, Heather Baber posted that line on social media when she announced that Baja Grill's Little Rock location would close. By August, the Arkansas Times could report who that someone was. Baber co-founded The Taco Society restaurant group with Craig Roe. She spent most of her days at the group's restaurants in downtown Benton, and she wanted the Heights location to go to someone who had worked in that room.

That person was Erin Jackson. She started at Baja as a host in 2016 and became general manager in 2020. On Tuesday, Oct. 6, 2026, Jackson and her sister Stephanie Harris retired the Baja Grill name at 5923 Kavanaugh Blvd. and opened Lime & Lotus Latin Asian Grill & Sidebar in the same space. They planned the switch so the restaurant would not close for a single day between the two concepts. The staff and the phone number are the same. The name and the menu are new.

On this stretch of Kavanaugh, the restaurant that reinvented itself fastest was the one whose people never left. Other storefronts and lots nearby have gone quiet for months or years while waiting for someone new.

From a Closing Notice to a New Name

The story spans about a dozen years at one address, and most of the turning points came within the last 16 months.

Under the Roe and Baber years, the Heights location won several Arkansas Times Readers' Choice Awards for its California-style tacos and burritos. The donation from a regular came just before the planned June 28, 2025 closing and kept the restaurant open for another month. In that time, Baber told the Arkansas Times, business picked up as people came in for what they thought was a last "Baja fix."

Baber's reasons for handing over the keys came down to Jackson's work record. "She's definitely put more work into it the past five years than I have," Baber told the paper. She added that Jackson "has barely missed a day of work in the last five years." Jackson announced the news on Facebook the following Monday and named her partners, her sister Stephanie Harris and brother-in-law Jason Files.

The Benton Baja Grill, where the business started, was a separate operation. In 2025, Baber said she still owned it, along with the neighboring Rōber :: Cocktails + Culinary and Revival :: Restaurant + Beer Garden on the same downtown Benton property. Since then, the Heights location has gone its own way.

Same Room, Same Staff, New Menu

Jackson and Harris ran the restaurant as Baja Grill for a little over a year before they changed the concept. When Jackson spoke with AY About You Magazine in September, she said the Baja staff would stay on at Lime & Lotus and that she and Harris would revamp and expand the space slowly to give it a new feel.

"We have appreciated everybody's love and support over the past decade," Jackson told AY. "I hope people continue to love and support our new place."

Baja regulars will recognize the format. Tacos and rice bowls are still the core, and queso is still on the table. The fillings and sides now draw on Korean, Thai, Filipino and Chinese-American cooking. The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette listed these items on the launch menu:

• Tacos or rice bowls: birria, bulgogi, chile lime shrimp, miso butter mahi mahi, pollo adovada, and honey garlic smoked chicken
• Starters and shareables: General Tso's Ribs, white or curry queso, poblano rangoon, and lumpia
• Soups: Thai curry tortilla soup, birria ramen, and kimchi soup

The hours have not changed, at least for now: 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. Tuesday through Thursday, 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. Friday and Saturday, and 3 to 8 p.m. Sunday. The phone number is still (501) 722-8920. The restaurant's own contact page lists Sunday hours a little differently, so a phone call before a Sunday visit will confirm them.

The owners have said up front that the opening is a work in progress. Before launch day, a post on the restaurant's Facebook page asked, "Are we ready? Nope. But that's okay. Our soft opening may last until the end of the year. Great things take time, right?" The Democrat-Gazette also reported that the older Baja website, which still covers the Benton location, had not been updated yet.

The Sidebar Opens in November

The second half of the name refers to a part of the restaurant that isn't open yet. According to the Lime & Lotus website, the Sidebar will be a dedicated area for guests who want a drink and small bites without a full meal, and it is scheduled to open in November.

The same page lists a party and event room and says work by local artists is for sale throughout the restaurant and bar. This lines up with what Jackson described to AY in September: the space will change in stages, around a team that already knows the building. No drink list has been published yet, and no first-look reviews had appeared as of mid-October.

Elsewhere on the Strip, Spaces Change Slower

Lime & Lotus changed concepts with no closed days. A few blocks east, the changes have taken longer.

5014 Kavanaugh Blvd. In April 2026, Heights Corner Market announced it would close its Heights location. As AY About You Magazine reported, the announcement came after the owners had already shared plans to renovate. Owners Eric and Lou Anne thanked neighbors in their farewell post with "You made this place what it was." The business continues in Hot Springs at 249 W. Grand Ave., and the owners are also working on a separate project, Lakeshore by Heights Corner Market, at 108 Ski Motel Point in Royal. As of this writing, no new tenant has been reported for the Kavanaugh storefront.

5008 Kavanaugh Blvd. The 5000 block also gained a business. Little Rock Soirée reported in March that E.Leigh's Boutique had moved its women's fashions from Hillcrest to 5008 Kavanaugh. Domestic Domestic moved the other direction, from The Heights into E.Leigh's former space at 2911 Kavanaugh. Both shops changed neighborhoods and stayed on Kavanaugh.

5700 Kavanaugh Blvd. The corner of Kavanaugh and North Fillmore Street is where a new restaurant is being built from scratch, and it shows how long that takes. In April 2025, the Arkansas Times reported that the Barnaby Group, founded by John and Mary Olive Stephens, would build The Lady on what was then a vacant lot. The plans call for a neighborhood pub inspired by the Tudor architecture of The Heights and Hillcrest, with a fireplace-lit dining room, street-level and rooftop patios, two full bars, and an all-day menu of "pub fare with a Southern accent" that includes a rotating family-style roast. The Lady will serve lunch, dinner and weekend brunch six days a week. The target opening was early 2027. Soirée's March 2026 update said The Lady was "slowly beginning to make her appearance" and still listed early 2027. If it opens on that schedule, the project will have taken about two years from announcement to opening.

The Barnaby Group's other Heights restaurant took a faster path. George's opened in 2023 after the group renovated the former Cafe Prego space at 5510 Kavanaugh Blvd. Reusing a finished dining room saved time there, and it saved even more time at 5923 Kavanaugh, where the building stayed the same and so did the staff.

The corner at Fillmore has been in the works since April 2025, and 5014 has had no reported successor since April 2026. At 5923, a team that has been there since 2016 put out a new menu on a Tuesday and kept serving.

Kristen Honea McCready has watched Kavanaugh storefronts change hands for decades, and she knows how a new restaurant on the corner or an empty space down the block affects a Heights home's value. If you'd like to see where your home stands as The Lady gets closer to opening and the 5000 block keeps changing, Kristen Honea McCready can start with a number. Get Your Instant Home Valuation.