A nod to the journey

by Jeff Miller

Everyone knows the restaurant business is about as steady as a bucking bronco. So why open a string of restaurants and one meal-prep service in and around Santa Barbara in a short amount of time?

That’s the question posed to Julian Martinez, chef/co-owner of Barbareño at 205 West Canon Perdido St. in Santa Barbara. He and partner Jesse Gaddy opened it in 2014, but then, starting in 2017, went on a tear, opening three others, all of which ran aground on the pandemic.

“I don’t know,” Martinez said. “It’s like a bug you get, opening restaurants. Maybe not a good bug but I love it. It’s a crazy adrenaline rush that’s hard to get other places.”

In the end, after the rushes, attention has returned to the flagship success story, Barbareño. And a success it’s been. Fans credit the restaurant holy trinity: gracious service, charming atmosphere, and creative food well presented.

For Martinez, it all began with a summer job at The Nugget in Summerland, where he was a dishwasher and a prep cook. “That got me into the industry,” he said.

In college (Claremont McKenna, east of LA), Martinez worked in a restaurant on campus, doing well enough to eventually be given the task of redesigning the menu. The hook was set.

After college he moved to the Bay Area, working in a series of restaurants including (ahem) The French Laundry. Don’t get excited, he cautioned.

“I was the lowest of the low. I made coffees and buffed glasses. So I was a well-dressed busboy.”

All along, Martinez was reading and studying restaurant management and food. Then he got a chance to move to Santa Barbara, where in 2014 he and a college friend, Jesse Gaddy, took over the former D’Vine Café on West Canon Perdido.

“Our original idea was a tri-tip sandwich shop,” Martinez said. But part of his studying included a bit of travel through Europe, during which the idea of upscaling Barbareño took hold. “It morphed into a nicer place.”

The opening in 2014 went smoothly, probably because the partners had spent a year planning. “It was my full-time job for that year,” Martinez said. “We were in the trenches from the start. Eighty- to 90-hour weeks, doing lots of the construction ourselves.” Then, after opening, “it was our whole life for a couple of years. But it went well.”

Well enough, in 2019, to glean a Michelin Plate, which is not a star but step in that direction.

His favorite menu item, the ricotta dumplings, feature more exotic combinations: house-made ricotta formed into dumplings, served with strawberry masala “that’s been cooked about four hours and seasoned like Indian curry almost. It sounds funny on paper but the flavors work great together. It just tastes like a California dish.”

In 2022 Martinez cooked all of it up in a different medium: a cookbook, with another twist. “It started as mostly stories for the staff, about the dishes and the stories behind them,” Martinez said. “By the time I got 50 or 60 of them, I realized if we weave them together there’s an interesting book there.”

The book, “Barbareño: Cuisine of California’s Central Coast,” is available through the restaurant’s website or at local bookstores. “It’s probably the most rewarding thing I’ve ever done professionally,” Martinez said.

Looking back over Barbareño’s first decade in business, Martinez likes what he sees. “It’s survived and is stronger than ever,” he said. His next goal: To make Cuban black beans as well as his mother does.

www.barbareno.com @barbareno

More Dining Out Articles