When Brad and Kathy Irwin, owners of Oregon Spirit Distillers, moved into their new premises on First Avenue and Hawthorne Street in northeast Bend in July, the Barrel Thief Lounge was merely a figment of their imaginations.

“We had some vision,” Brad said, but it stopped at eight barstools and a deep fryer.

The distillery, which the Irwins opened in 2009, had outgrown its original space in a strip mall off Butler Market Road. But finding a new home “came with some requirements,” Brad said. “We had to have the right zoning, of course. And we knew we wanted a tasting room where people could go, so it couldn’t be in the middle of nowhere.

“When we found this space and saw the assets we had to work with, the original vision started to move. We saw that we could do something bigger and better.”

Today, the Barrel Thief is a hidden treasure that Bend residents are just beginning to discover. Two blocks off the city’s main north-south arterial, it doesn’t get a lot of casual, drive-by traffic. But once found, it’s hard to forget.

Long and low-lit, with 42 seats at the bar, individual tables and a cushioned corner area, the lounge is a distinct counterpoint to the always-brightly-lit distillery room. It has hanging lights and sconces for candles, plus a garage door that rolls open on warm days to reveal a spacious patio with a trio of fire pits.

Meat, cheese, veggies

The chef is young Josh Sona, formerly of Spork and the Broken Top Bottle Shop.

“Sarah (restaurant manager Sarah Wiggers) stumbled on him after we opened,” Brad Irwin said. “He understood our kitchen limitations and he loves cooking with spirits. He just has an aptitude for it. And he knows a ton about pickling.”

Indeed, the house-pickled vegetables — served alone or to accompany charcuterie and cheese boards — are a highlight of the fare here.

And they go perfectly with craft cocktails from mixologist Nicole Rushton. (In winter, those pickled veggies will be replaced by a roasted veggie salad.)

Don’t be thinking dill pickles and cornichons, nor even pickled carrots and string beans. Sona’s offerings are more unique: sliced red grapes, for instance. Thinly sliced zucchini pickles were offered on some sandwiches. The veggie bowl also featured radishes, onions, red peppers and small, very thinly sliced beets. And spiced applesauce was a highlight at one of my two recent meals here.

That came with the cheese plate, which featured Cada Dia goat cheese, Manchego sheep’s-milk cheese from Spain, and a mild aged white cheddar from England.

The excellent charcuterie plate included sliced chorizo sausage and Italian salami, along with Sweetheart ham (pork knuckle brined in juniper berries, from Olympia Provisions in Portland). It was presented with stone ground mustard and, like the cheese plate, slices of toasted French bread.

Sandwich choices

In two recent visits, my dining companion and I have enjoyed several sandwiches.

Sona showed his talent with spirits in the CW Irwin Bourbon BBQ pulled pork sando, which of course uses one of Oregon Spirits Distillers’ own products. The zesty barbecue sauce is made with the whiskey, which then is mixed with meat and layered thickly atop a roll from Big Ed’s Bend bakery. Sliced zucchini pickles finish it off.

As good as this sandwich was, I actually preferred a previous day’s special — a Vietnamese-inspired banh mi with pork belly, eggplant, Thai basil, thinly sliced carrot and onion. A hummus spread was perfect on the French roll, down-soft on the inside but perfectly crispy outside.

My companion combined meat, cheese and greens — chorizo, Manchego and arugula — in another sandwich. She enjoyed it as much as I liked my own meals. And on another occasion, she opted for the “smoked dog,” another Olympia Provisions product. Smothered in sauerkraut and mustard made with the distillery’s own One-Eyed Jon Rum, it was delicious. I know. I had a bite.

A unique touch on every Barrel Thief sandwich is a serving of about a dozen Pringles potato chips. Why Pringles?

“My father, who was a food-processing engineer for Proctor & Gamble, invented the machine that put the Pringle in the can,” Irwin explained. “That was in Sacramento, in 1967, the year I was born. Four years later, in Jackson, Tennessee, he invented another machine to get the Pringle off the conveyor belt and into the can.

“But anyway, everybody loves the Pringle. It’s a great bar food.”

Salad and soup

So, for that matter, is a good salad. The Barrel Thief’s “seasonal green salad” was so much more than that. Folded into crispy hearts of romaine were bits of crunchy chorizo, pickled red peppers and onions and bleu-cheese crumbles. Dressed with vinaigrette and served with lightly toasted slices of French bread, the salad could be eaten with one’s fingers.

One or two soups are also available daily. We tried both the bourbon butternut squash and pepper-vodka cauliflower curry purées, and both were delicious.

A new seasonal menu is set to be released on Dec. 1. The main addition will be a handful of hearty rice bowls: pork belly, pulled pork, chorizo-arugula and veggie, featuring eggplant. Vegetarian and gluten-free diners are not ignored.

The Irwins have a long background in both restaurant work and management. Brad, who managed the bar at 5 Fusion & Sushi Bar in 2009 and 2010, previously owned a board game store in Bend for more than a decade. Kathy spent 15 years in spa management before joining her husband in opening Oregon Spirit Distillers.

— Reporter: janderson@bendbulletin.com