SLO County brewery adds an upscale dining menu – with a unique approach to food pairing

Diners looking for an upscale meal out have a new option in Atascadero: Pair with Dead Oak, where beers brewed in-house and local wines are married with a seasonal, rotating farm-to-table menu that turns a common culinary approach on its ear.

Pair with Dead Oak is an expansion of Dead Oak Brewery, which has been located on Entrada Avenue for the past four years, just around the corner from Atascadero City Hall and Sunken Gardens.

It’s the brainchild of husband-and-wife team Nikki and Jesse Kaltenberg, who launched Dead Oak in 2017, and executive chef Rachel Ponce.

Since 2019, the Kaltenbergs had been wanting to add a restaurant to their brewery but needed to find a chef to help them develop a food-and-wine program that captured their vision and could attract a broader customer base.

“We knew we didn’t want hamburgers or hot dogs. We wanted food that spoke for itself, had its own draw, and brought in a different type of clientele than what we were accustomed to seeing,” said Nikki Kaltenberg, whose husband is Dead Oak’s lead brewer. “We wanted to cast a wider net of the type of people who might want to come and spend time in our space, so we knew we wanted to go in a higher-end direction.”

Enter Ponce, a private chef from Paso Robles whom the Kaltenbergs met in early 2020 when they hired her to cater a dinner for Dead Oak’s beer club members.

Nikki Kaltenberg and Ponce clicked right away, and by the end of Kaltenbeg’s proposal, they agreed to open a restaurant together.

The COVID-19 pandemic delayed progress for a bit, but by the beginning of this year, Pair with Dead Oak was born, and the ownership team grew from two to four after Ponce and Kaltenbergs’ brother-in-law, Mathias Kaltenberg, were brought on as co-owners.

The restaurant half of the business opened this summer with a new kitchen and some fresh paint and curtains, said Kaltenberg, who emphasized that just because Pair with Dead Oak offers an upscale menu and high-quality wine and beer list doesn’t mean people should expect a “hoity-toity” experience.

“We’re doing really phenomenal food and really great service, but we’re still a brewery,” said Kaltenberg.

Chef brings an innovative pairing approach to Dead Oak

The idea to serve a pairing meal in a laid-back brewery setting is not the most conventional model, and Ponce’s menu approach is unique as well.

Upon arriving, restaurant patrons can expect to find a comfortable dining room with an open-air kitchen directed by the warm and effusive “Chef Rachel,” who speaks with a friendly Chicago accent and chats with diners about her unconventional pairings and a culinary philosophy.

While many chefs emphasize pairing complimentary flavors, for example, Ponce focuses on contrasting tastes. Also, while many chefs typically let the food drive the pairings, she works in the opposite way.

Ponce said she starts by tasting a particular bottle of wine or beer and writing down tasting notes unique to that particular bottle. Once she has a good understanding of the flavor profile of the wine and beer, she’ll brainstorm dishes that can help make the drink flavors pop.

“If you have a rich, meaty red, I am not going to pair it with a rich, meaty dish,” Ponce said. “I’m going to share it with a salad.”

For example, people dining at Pair with Dead Oak for brunch can order a smoked salmon salad on an everything bagel. Recommended pairing? A glass of the 2017 Arbuckle Ridge cabernet sauvignon, or a pint of Dead Oak’s maple pecan brown ale.

“Now you’re hitting all the six different flavors on your palate, and it emerges together so that wine is part of your dish,” said Ponce. “I want you to take a bite and I want you to go back to the beer or wine and take a sip, and just be craving it, going back and forth.”

There is no rule that you have to order based on the pairings Ponce devised, but typically diners are eager to try the food-and-drink combinations that challenge conventional culinary wisdom.

She said her overall cooking philosophy is to let spices and seasoning drive the flavor profile of the food and treat proteins as more of a blank canvas.

For example, instead of pairing her duck ragu papparadelle with a chardonnay or a lighter red, Ponce opts to elevate the flavor by recommending the dish be accompanied by Dead Oak’s English brown and for wine drinkers, the Arbuckle Ridge cab.

“I am creative, and the pairings are so specific,” Ponce said. “I love being able to explain my pairings and seeing people’s reactions.”

In particular, she said that she gets a lot of questions about her dessert pairings. Instead of following the tradition of pairing chocolate with red wine, Ponce likes to pair chocolate with white wine.

“So why would I care about red wine with a piece of chocolate if it’s going to cancel out those flavors?” said Ponce. “If you pair an acidic white wine and a bittersweet chocolate, those are contrasting flavors, and it’s like an explosion in your mouth. My mouth is watering just thinking about it.”

An intimate, not intimidating experience

Since the restaurant opened roughly two months ago, Kaltenberg said the team has received a lot of positive feedback from the local community, including from the regulars who loved just grabbing a beer at the Dead Oak Brewery.

“By and large, our existing customers and our new customers are very pleased,” Kaltenberg said.

Ponce said some regulars have come in more than once, sometimes in the same week, to try out the various pairings that are on the menu.

The online buzz about the launch of Pair with Dead Oak has been positive.

In August, Yelp reviewer Kristin J from San Luis Obispo gave Pair with Dead Oak five stars, describing it as: “A perfect addition to downtown Atascadero and a great night out — I would highly recommend.”

In a Google review written three weeks ago, diner Angela Klebe described her experience at Pair with Dead Oak as intimate, but not intimidating.

“There was a relaxed atmosphere that I appreciated, a space for everyone,” Klebe wrote. “The sauces & vibrancy of textures were my favorite in the sablefish. We tried 4 dishes and I would highly recommend them all!”

The sablefish was an item was on the summer menu. Ponce plans to rotate the menu every seven weeks to accommodate the changing seasons and availability of fresh ingredients. Now, Ponce and the Pair with Dead Oak Team have moved on to fall.

At the end of the day, the team at Pair with Dead Oak doesn’t want you to feel like you need a sophisticated palate, they just want you to have a good time.

“I want you to ask questions,” said Ponce. “I don’t care if you’ve never had a sip of wine and you feel like it’s a stupid question.”

Nikki Kaltenberg agreed.

“I think probably what makes people perceive the space as being so much more high-end now is when we get ready for dinner service. We have settings out now. There’s wine glasses on the table, there’s cloth napkins, I bought gold flatware,” she said. “It just looks a little more pulled together.”

But she assures everyone that Dead Oak hasn’t lost touch with its roots.

“You’re still getting some sass from us,” Kaltenberg said. “We’re having a good time, too.”

In order to accommodate a small but busy kitchen, Pair with Dead Oak requests that diners reserve a table in advance, but people just interested in having a drink can sit at the indoor bar in spots reserved for walk-ins and on the outdoor patio reserved for beer and wine sales without needing to call ahead.

Pair with Dead Oak is open Thursday through Saturday from 5 p.m. until 10 p.m., and open for brunch service on Sundays from 10 a.m. until 3 p.m. Click here to make a reservation or visit bit.ly/3COL8LT.

This story was originally published September 27, 2021 at 5:00 AM.