THE BARBARIAN

By Renee Watkins

Located within Kinship’s sprawling compound, Barbarian is a 32-seat, Sunday-only restaurant that focuses on New Midwestern cuisine. We were left in a lurch following the November closure of Des Moines’ beloved gem, Proof. In the wake of such a loss, Barbarian’s social media teased us with images of beautifully plated small dishes bursting with color, hinting they might be able to fill the gap. It quickly became apparent that reservations would fill up fast—and they did.

Following an unforgettable 12-course tasting menu experience during their opening month, the early days of Barbarian proved more than worthy of preservation for posterity. This is the future of Waukee’s broadening individuality.

I sat with Jacob DeMars, Head Chef of Barbarian, to talk about context, culture, and concept. I wanted an inside look at how his experiences elsewhere shaped his commitment to Barbarian and Kinship as flagship stamps on Waukee’s cultural presence.

Jacob DeMars is a Rockport, Massachusetts native. This small fishing town is a known tourist locale that relies heavily on seasonal work. As the son of a tuna fisherman who didn’t believe in an allowance, DeMars began his ride in the restaurant world as a dishwasher at age 12.

At age 13 he held his first cooking job as a fry cook for Portside Chowder House, which later became a 7th Wave Restaurant that is still there today. Although the winter seasons required temp jobs at a cafeteria, DeMars returned to 7th Wave and worked there until he was 22.

Waukee is the fastest-growing city in Iowa— boasting beautiful trails, great schools, and safe neighborhoods. While residential development is on track to outpace commercial growth, many of us wonder what kind of local culture we can be a part of. An influx of predictable chains would offer little in terms of a unique experience.

Although places like Des Moines and Valley Junction offer livelihood, those of us living in Waukee may not want to keep playing tourist twenty minutes away. The evolving personality of the City of Waukee rests on the shoulders of ambitiously creative people capable of envisioning our city as its own thing—a destination. Enter the perfect marriage between Waukee-specific roots and worldly influence found at Kinship Brewing Company, and its innovative moonlighter restaurant, Barbarian.

DeMars left for Denver at age 22 and got a job at an Italian restaurant and then at a hotel. He ended up at a restaurant called Beast and Bottle, where DeMars says he received his first real opportunity to experiment with food in ways similar to Barbarian.

Beast and Bottle Chef, Paul Riley, encouraged DeMars to apply elsewhere. DeMars’s applications saw rejection after rejection in what he calls “an early lesson in humility.” He finally landed a one-week stint at Husk in South Carolina.

DeMars then went to Chicago, where he got a job at Elizabeth Restaurant. This move to Elizabeth came with a dual purpose. First, DeMars knew he wanted to work at a Michelin-starred restaurant. Although Elizabeth did not have a star, he knew it had potential and wanted to be a part of making that happen. Elena, Elizabeth’s head chef, led the charge to get the star. Once they received one star, everything in the restaurant shifted to next-level focus on obtaining another. The second purpose of the move was to gain experience doing a fast-line style, tasting-menuonly restaurant. DeMars admits he feeds off the adrenaline this type of environment provides.

While in Chicago and under the name Open Circuit, DeMars also prepared private dinners in clients’ homes. A crawl through his social media delivers a striking picture of his creative approach to plating. He took his best-loved pages from Saga and Black Science, his favorite comic books, and used them as plating inspiration. Bright splatters of vibrant purees, meticulously placed microflora, and a surprising mix of textures prove that DeMars is not afraid to play with food.

When asked why he stopped doing Open Circuit, DeMars admits, “I got burnt out because I’d have to go to a restaurant and pick up a full fish and pig's head and take them home with me on the train, like a big pig snout sticking out and everything; three to four times a week with stuff like that is a lot—too much.” Combining that kind of grind with the volatility of making do in a stranger’s kitchen made it easy to pull out a funny memory. DeMars recalls, “I once had a table full of guests just get up and leave to smoke cigarettes on the patio for 45 minutes. I didn’t want to be there all night, so I kept putting food on the table—course after course—and figured they would come back whenever they wanted.”

Following the scrappiness required for Open Circuit, and the Michelin star success of Elizabeth, DeMars moved to Iowa. He opened his restaurant in Windsor Heights under the name RI, which stands for Rockport, Iowa. He describes RI as “an early rendition of Barbarian.”

Although the reception was promising, DeMars realized that there wasn’t much of an audience for eccentric food. Thus, RI was a concession in many ways—DeMars brought prices down by offering familiar dishes and turned the exclusive into something more accessible. However, like the owners of every other restaurant scrambling during a pandemic, DeMars was uncertain regarding the likelihood of continued success. COVID-19 was “an earthquake for small restaurants.”

Meanwhile, Zach Dobeck, the owner of Kinship Brewing, had dined at RI. DeMars and Dobeck had gone out for beers a few times, however, it wasn’t until DeMars got word that Kinship was on the hunt for a chef that the two began getting to know each other. In addition to needing a chef for his food truck and restaurant, Next of Kin, Dobeck wanted the restaurant to get a menu overhaul.

Next of Kin opened in November of 2021 and featured the brewery’s reliable taproom menu with delicious variations of American bar food. While DeMars was busy running Next of Kin and the eclectic food truck, construction began on Kinship’s detached kitchen space outside the main brewery building. DeMars saw that there was ample space to do more. What started as an idea to do a pop-up style, ten-course private dinner in Kinship’s garden turned into the concept of a restaurant within a restaurant. That idea for more gave Dobeck and DeMars little time to pull everything together. DeMars recalls “running around like crazy and jokes about getting a burner phone to make reservations. The huge checklist was this thing that, looking at it later, I couldn’t believe I got it all done.” DeMars was working on the menu and logistics of both Next of Kin and the restaurant within it simultaneously.

DeMars said his biggest challenge with Barbarian was, "Coming up with the tasting menu."

"I believe there is a foreseeable success there, but finding the amounts and finding out how the dishes would sit next to each other—pork, chicken, beef, starch, vegetable—I want to give them everything. I didn’t want anyone leaving here feeling under or overfed.” becoming a no-waste kitchen that includes farm-to-table vegetables, whole animal nose-to-tail butchers, and developing more connections with local farms while also having an on-site utilitarian garden of its own. While the restaurants are already doing their own pickling, DeMars has ambitions to extend their skillset to include dairy fermentation for housemade butter, sour cream, and cheese.

DeMars hopes the space will allow their chefs to branch into areas of specialization—each according to their ability and desire. He calls this “organic freedom” and says, “If we can create something ourselves and knock the menu costs down a little bit…that’s another win. The story is still unfolding because it all happened so quickly. As long as people keep coming, we’ll keep doing it.”

This dedication to bringing ambitious plans to fruition leaves it no surprise that Dobeck trusted DeMars’s reasoning behind the proposed name for their restaurant within a restaurant.

DeMars pulled it all out from inside as he proudly stated that “Barbarian is named for all the people I’ve worked alongside. You feel like a certain type of person with this kind of work—you’re worn out, and you have to rinse and repeat every day, like a beast.”

Everything went according to plan, and Next of Kin’s new taproom menu became available two days after the first Sunday dinner service for Barbarian. While this piece was supposed to be dedicated to the innovation of Barbarian alone, it is impossible to extricate its story from that of Kinship as a whole. Kinship Brewing, Next of Kin, and Barbarian function as a collective rather than three separate entities.

The sprawling space is working toward

Barbarian is a tasting menu restaurant with reservations offered for Sundays only. If you are lucky enough to secure a reservation, you can look forward to DeMars’ meticulous plating, creative combinations, and unexpected techniques. DeMars visits each table after every dinner service, and his sheepish charm and humble approach make him easy to like. He genuinely cares about bringing a uniquely exquisite experience to the Waukee area, encouraging the average Midwestern palate to go on an adventure without taking itself too seriously.

Barbarian is the future

of Waukee dining and culture. This is the culmination of hardworking roots and bigcity ideas delivered with Iowa-nice attitudes. This is edification without condescension. Well done, Barbarian. We love you already.