Barrio server Tim Frandsen, standing center, delivers plates of food on Barrio’s patio in Bend in 2016. Barrio's, at 915 NW Wall St. is currently closed for renovations and should reopen in May 2023.

Success for a restaurant in a small space doesn’t always assure greater accomplishment in a larger one. But owner and executive chef Steven Draheim of Barrio could not be happier with his recent move.

“It was always a dance of chaos on Minnesota Avenue,” Draheim said of his former 48-seat cafe. When he moved around the corner to Wall Street on March 1, four years to the day after he opened the original Barrio, he nearly tripled his space overnight.

The new Barrio occupies premises that have had numerous tenants, most recently Sweet Saigon. When it became available again about the first of the year, “I seized on the opportunity,” Draheim said.

In Latin America, the cuisine the Barrio menu reflects, a “barrio” is a neighborhood. “But we were often so full that locals couldn’t get in for two hours,” Draheim said. “It was draining on me.”

There’s no such issue at the new restaurant, which seats 90 at two large indoor rooms and an additional 40 on a spacious patio beside Brooks Street. Contractors restored the floors, opened up the rooms for more ambient light and repainted the walls mustard and rust colors. In the front room, individual diners share high, galvanized-metal tables of parallelogram shape, matching the angle of the front window. “It was part of our challenge to keep the ‘barrio’ feel, and I think we succeeded,” Draheim said.

Latin street flavors

The menu hasn’t expanded, however. Draheim fought the urge to add to his list of Spanish and Latin American street foods, which already included paellas and shared-plate tapas. He does alter offerings seasonally, however, and his new larger bar offers a broader list of craft cocktails.

Although the chef is a Bend native, his menu is a direct result of years spent in Tucson, just north of the border of Mexico. “I got my chops there,” he said.

Originally intending to play baseball at the University of Arizona, he was detoured by life experiences and ended up returning to Oregon for culinary school. But he twice more returned to Tucson to work for renowned chef Janos Wilder, on either side of a job as head chef at Camp Sherman’s Kokanee Cafe. When he returned to Bend to stay, he began with a mobile food cart, Soupçon, that evolved into the Barrio kitchen.

Lunch features numerous salads and sandwiches that don’t recur on the dinner menu. On a recent visit with my companion, I sampled three of them. As with a subsequent evening meal, we found every dish delicious.

The soup of the day was a variation on a tortilla soup. Chunks of pork with a variety of fresh vegetables — including cabbage, carrots, onion, celery, tomato, radish and hominy grits — made a thick stew seasoned with cilantro and lime and topped with grilled tortilla strips and fresh avocado slices. A full bowl can be a meal in itself.

Jibarito were sandwiches of plantain, which had a toastlike quality when fried, filled with meat (veggies were an option) along with salad greens, guacamole and a squeeze of lime. The Barriodilla was a house creation, a quesadilla stuffed with cauliflower, kale, mushrooms, kernel corn and melted jack cheese and topped with spicy salsa. We added sliced steak for a little extra protein.

Paella and tapas

Paella, a traditional Spanish rice casserole, has always been a dinnertime special at Barrio. But the menu also features a handful of grilled entree plates (steak, salmon, lamb, stuffed Portobello mushroom) and a wide range of tapas.

We shared three of the tapas before we dug into a paella. My favorites were duck and date pinchos, a snack of pitted medjool dates stuffed with duck confit, seasoned with blackberry sauce and almonds and served with a spinach-and-radish salad.

A plate of broccoli (grilled with tangy botanero cheese, Oaxacan aioli, corn nuts and lemon) was wonderful. And Aba’s lamb bombas — potato dumplings stuffed with lamb and apricot chutney, seasoned with tomato jam and green chimichurri sauce — were amazing.

Then we had a small dish of house paella, which after the other courses was still plenty for two. While many paellas are served with shellfish and other seafood (which also is available at Barrio), we chose a simple house paella with chicken and chorizo sausage. And again, we thoroughly enjoyed it. The rice was moist and perfectly seasoned, and a side salad with a jalapeno-basil dressing was a fine complement.

In lieu of cocktails, my friend enjoyed a glass of sweet sangria wine. I had an imported white Basque wine called Txakolina, not often seen at area restaurants.

— janderson@bendbulletin.com.