You say you’re stressed out, and you’d love some good news? Well, here’s a twofer. The first is that Drumlin, the sleek sister bar to Shoreline’s living-roomy Ridgecrest Public House, is open once again, after a longer-than-planned closure that lasted until mid-February. Even better, the neighborhood bar-resto has brought on legendary Seattle chef, restaurateur, and farm-to-table food scholar Zephyr Paquette to manage and advise on the fresh reincarnation. 

It’s hard to remember a Seattle that Paquette wasn’t cooking in. An incomplete list of her affiliations includes Terra Plata, Café Flora, Dandelion, Elliott Bay Cafe (both locations), Marjorie, and Lecosho, in addition to her own restaurants: Richmond Beach pizzeria Le Petit Paquet as well as the crowdfunded and community-focused Skelly and the Bean on Capitol Hill. Among other achievements, she was a scholarship recipient to Quillisascut Farm School; was among the original team behind Smoke Farm’s Burning Beast fundraiser-slash-festival; and was mentored by the late, great Chef Tamara Murphy. Today, after several decades of culinary work in this city, Paquette employs the same field-to-plate, farmers-market-based culinary ethos and habits in her work

Although Paquette is officially serving as Drumlin’s GM, she’s also acting as the chef for now, as the current sous chef, Lucas Cobb, ramps up for the role. As well, she was a consultant on the shop’s reopen, a major player behind designing the restaurant’s new menus, concept, and vision. When owners Megan Kogut and Jarred Swalwell, who also own the Ridgecrest Public House next door, opened Drumlin in 2020, it was a tame — if lovely — menu of sandwiches, hummus ‘n’ pita, and tomato soup, alongside craft beer, wine, and cider. 

Paquette says some things have stayed the same at Drumlin, too — the pretzel knots with beer cheese is a holdout from the legacy menu, and I recognize the charcuterie boards too, even if they’re being sourced differently now. Live music may be added to the roster as well, alongside the events that Drumlin hosted before the break, like book club meetings and karaoke nights.

Among the restyled menu’s stars include the cacio e pepe risotto topped with burrata and tomato dust, Paquette’s signature beluga lentils with bratwurst and kale (“I’ve made these lentils for 20 years, everywhere I go, and they’re never not a hit,” Paquette notes), and a stunning side of roasted carrots, served in a pool of maple goat yogurt and pomegranate molasses and studded with feta and pepitas. 

It’s the kind of dish where you wish you’d brought along a little rubber spatula, like you’d use to scrape brownie batter out of the bowl, so you could scoop up all the gorgeous, creamy morass of yogurt and molasses and salty cheese and nutty pepita bits that’re left on the plate, once the (beautifully roasted) carrots are gone. It’s a celestial elixir.

With a resume like hers, it’s safe to assume that everything on the list will be done with creativity, balance, and attention to detail. That extends to some of the lower-res items that I might’ve missed without her help. On a menu, it’s hard to make bread and butter sound like something to get lathered up about, since we all know how easy it is to phone in. When it came out, the crostini-adjacent bread was perfectly nice (sourced by Macrina, I believe?), but the butter upon it was next-level: grated over the top of the in thick curls and accented with black salt and marigold petals, and just impossibly rich. 

“You have our beautiful grated Italian butter there, yeah,” Paquette says. “I found this extra-fatty, super-rich Italian butter — burro d’Italia — and it’s got such star power that I like to excessively microplane it onto the bread, to give folks a nice big fat fluffy pile of butter. Like, it’s about the butter. The bread’s great too, but bread is secondary when you have butter like this. Right?” 

It’s a good metaphor for what’s happened at Drumlin. In comparison to its first form, Drumlin 2.0 is more intentional, more streamlined, and certainly more luxurious, with its chic cocktails, homey lentils and curly piles of European butter. That added sheen of luxury is the point, per Kogut and Swalwell’s original vision. Still cozy, still chill, with the same old garlic knots and beer cheese, but this place has a lot more identity this round — and a lot more space to try on new ideas. What a cool, promising gift South Shoreline has received, in Paquette and Drumlin both.