Written by Julie Tremaine, SF Gate | Reference Source
When Jim Buell built Zaca Creek in the early 1960s, it was the kind of place where you could ride your horse right up to the door and hitch it up while you went inside to tie one on. In Buellton, a town named after Buell’s family, the place was what the Santa Barbara Independent called a “beloved steakhouse and raucous saloon.” There are as many stories of bar fights and legendary blowouts as there are fondly remembered spins around the dance floor. It was also the kind of establishment that, with its enormous dining hall and capacity for hundreds of guests, became unsustainable as modern restaurants have trended smaller and smaller, and the surrounding Santa Ynez Valley evolved into the wine destination it is today. It closed for good in 2001.
When married couple Chelsea Rushing and Stephen Villa decided to revive the restaurant, the bullet holes they left in the wall were only one of the ways they preserved the spirit of the old place. “From the very beginning, we realized what a huge part of the community it had been,” Rushing says. “From the second construction started, people were showing up.” There was even a community-created Facebook group called the Reopening of Zaca Creek. The people who were coming, they recount, shared stories of having their first drinks at the tavern when they turned 21, or of getting married there in the 1980s. “It was something that was really deeply rooted in the entire valley,” Rushing adds, “not just Buellton, but the whole community.”
The Tavern at Zaca Creek has reopened after sitting abandoned for 20 years.
Courtesy of Michelle Ramierez PhotographySanta Ynez Valley is one of the beautiful anomalies that makes California such a rich place to explore. Tucked away in the easternmost part of Santa Barbara County, it’s a place that is equal parts Wild West and Wine Country. There are 120 wineries packed into 400 square miles, and it feels like everything that isn’t planted vineyards is horse farms and cow pastures, with the hazy blues and greens of the Santa Ynez and San Rafael mountains rising just beyond.
The new Zaca Creek leans into that history. The couple preserved as many details as they could, including the actual wooden bar from the old tavern, some furniture, and those legendary bullet holes. “One of the original servers told us it was just a cowboy who had a little too much to drink and just started firing off some shots,” Rushing says. “It was like, ‘alright, put your gun away, here’s another drink.’”
Half of what was a 250-seat restaurant is now six guest rooms.
Courtesy of Michelle Ramierez PhotographyMusician Jeffrey Pine moved to Santa Ynez Valley in 1983, and lived on the property for a few years in his camper van. The deal he had with Buell was that he was free to live on the back lot in exchange for performing for the pre-dinner crowd a few nights a week. “The fun part was that the bartenders also lived in their vehicles on the same lot,” he says. “There was quite the surfer/musician hangout there back in those days. It was a fun time.” His job, as he describes it, was to keep the people happy while they waited an hour or more for a table. That long of a wait in a restaurant with 250 seats says a lot about the popularity of the place in its heyday. “It was always so packed that people were waiting out the door and all around the building,” he recalls.
They converted half the dining space into six hotel rooms decorated with centuries-old antique carved wooden bed frames that somehow blend seamlessly into a rustic California ranch building with rough-hewn stone walls.
The Tavern Burger: a Wagyu patty with white cheddar, black garlic truffle aioli, grilled onions and smoked tomato chutney.
Courtesy of Michelle Ramierez PhotographyWhat once was the barn that housed the dance hall and saloon is now the Buellhouse, a space for private functions and wine tastings. Just up the hill is The Falls, a new bio-lagoon pool for hotel guests. Later this year, The Treehouse will be a casual bites and cocktails space actually elevated and built around an enormous sycamore tree.
On the tavern menu: local Santa Barbara seafood like abalone and spiny lobsters, Central Coast produce, and aged Fullblood Wagyu beef that comes from just minutes down the road. It’s all prepared by Chef Cullen Campbell, who ran restaurants in Phoenix before coming to Santa Ynez Valley. Proximity to the source allows the restaurant to purchase cows and do whole-animal butchering in house. The food is slightly more elevated than the Santa Maria barbecue the area is known for, but is still accessible. “It’s hitting that spot,” Rushing says. “It’s a little beyond people’s comfort zones and then once they have it they’re like, ‘oh my gosh, how did I ever live without this?’”
