Burgers and fine dining under one roof at Seasoned, inside Claim 52

After years of perfecting his craft in Eugene’s restaurant scene, chef Garrett Kirsch leveled up his burger spatula for a more refined approach to cooking. Together with his wife and culinary partner, Felicia Kirsch, the duo closed Northwest Burgers, their restaurant for nearly 10 years, and opened Seasoned inside the new location of Claim 52 Brewing.

The much larger space allows Kirsch to not only keep some of his favorites from the burger menu but also implement the seasonal menus he had long dreamed about.

Garrett and Felicia’s love story began in the kitchen at Lane Community College’s culinary program, where they met when they were students in 2005. The two-year associate degree program provided a foundation for them to learn restaurant work and hospitality from an accredited program.

“The chef-instructors we had were incredible,” said Kirsch, who particularly remembers chef Chris Crosthwaite, who died of cancer in 2020. Kirsch keeps a photo of chef Crosthwaite on the dining room wall.

“It helps me,” Kirsch said. “He was very strict, which really made me follow certain guidelines. So I like having him up there, following, watching down on me.”

During culinary school, Kirsch’s plan was always to open his own restaurant, and once he and Felicia became a couple, the idea of working together as a duo was appealing. Felicia helped raise the couple’s two children, while Garrett took advice from a mentor who advised him that if he wanted to open his own place he should work for independent restaurants, rather than hotels or large catering companies.

After graduating from the LCC program, Kirsch embarked on an apprenticeship under the now-closed Mookie’s Place with chef Randy Hollister. After that, he became head chef of B2 Wine Bar, now B2 Bar and Grill, on Shadowview Drive near Crescent Village. Kirsch’s experience at B2 sparked a love for beverage pairings, which later would influence Seasoned’s approach.

“I was the head chef there for about five years, and then I wanted to learn new things and do new things,” he said.

He helped a family open a small farm-to-table Italian restaurant called Baker Butcher in the 5th Street Public Market Eateries food court. That’s where Kirsch got the idea that there needed to be a burger restaurant in the food court, and Kirsch already had a burger restaurant concept mapped out.

In 2014, Kirsch opened Northwest Burgers with a plan to make burgers built from local ingredients, a novel approach for most burger restaurants at the time. The restaurant expanded to a larger location in 5th Street Public Market — where Poppi’s Greek restaurant is set to now move — in 2018, just months before the pandemic hit.

“It really taught me a lot about how to pivot and understand that some things are out of my control,” Kirsch said.

Northwest Burgers was successful, but Kirsch says he just wanted to do something completely different. The burger concept left him feeling creatively constrained. He didn’t want to always be known as “the burger guy” or “the meat guy.” For five years, he quietly developed seasonal menus at home.

“I probably made about eight different seasonal menus that I wanted to do, just personally, to keep my brain going,” he said. “I was doing a lot of research and development at home to finalize my recipes. It really took a long time to get where I wanted to be at with them.”

The Kirsches decided to start creating pop-up dinners based on his menus. The response was positive, and the couple noticed that one man attended all six pop-ups. That man turned out to be Jeremiah Marsden, the new owner of Claim 52 Brewing, who took over the brewery and restaurant in May 2024.

“He was a fan of our food, and we started to really talk,” said Kirsch. “He wanted to bring our food over” to the new location. Claim 52 had moved to 232 Lincoln St. after WildCraft Cider Works left that location for the empty Yachats Brewing building in Yachats.

Now, Claim 52 is set to expand its brewery production from a 10-barrel system to a 20- barrel system, tripling its production in 2026.

Local connections

Seasoned’s menu takes advantage of the best produce of each season while keeping the local connections that Northwest Burgers used, such as buns from Reality Kitchen and Anderson Ranch beef.

“You’re still getting our house sauce that we had at Northwest Burgers, so if there’s things that you miss from Northwest Burgers, you can still get close to that flavor profile,” Kirsch said. “But I wanted to bring other gastropub ideas to it.”

That “gastropub” idea, meaning a menu of casual pub fare that’s a few steps above traditional fried bar food, lends itself to seasonal creamy bisque soups ($6 or $12), smashburgers and black bean burgers ($15 and $18), and steak bites and frites ($17).

Plus, of course, the menu holds things that go well with beer, such as fried chicken wings with garlic parmesan buffalo sauce ($17). Claim 52 also held on to some favorites from the original location, including the birria nachos ($21) using Anderson Ranch beef, with cheese sauce made in-house and tortillas sourced from Springfield’s Tortilleria El Metate.

“I was able to put my own spin on the Claim 52 menu and really make it our own,” Kirsch said, of adapting some original dishes while also introducing new dishes.

Chef’s Table 

The intimate six-course Chef’s Table Menu ($125) is another story. Kirsch offers this special menu for 12 tables with a single 5 p.m. seating Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday only. On those nights, Kirsch has two employees focus on the food for Claim 52 while Kirsch cooks and plates the entire Chef’s Table menu himself, while Felicia manages the hospitality. Each course is paired with Claim 52 beers, or wine or other beers that go well with the food.

“The menu will be constantly changing,” Kirsch said. “It will be going with the flow of what’s at the market. We go to the market twice a week, and then we also have deliveries from local farms.”

Felicia brings her hospitality experience to all Chef’s Table services and also helps with catering and events.

“This is a duo,” Kirsch said. “She is putting as much love and effort into this place as I am.”

On Aug. 12, Kirsch started the Chef’s Table meal with pesto bruschetta with local mozzarella paired with a sauvignon blanc made from New Zealand grapes by Ray Walsh of Capitello Wines, followed by silky, flavorful heirloom tomato soup. The third course was halibut crudo with pickled fennel, which was based off the winning dish at last year’s Lane County Farmers Market cooking competition.

The fourth course was grilled octopus served with tomatillo salsa and a thick slice of heirloom tomato with fried capers. Kirsch told the diners that the octopus was cooked sous vide for six hours in achiote then marinated overnight in the juices. It was perfectly paired with a Claim 52 beer called Murph, brewed in collaboration with Interstellar Brewery in Toluca, Mexico. The light hazy IPA is finished with guava and passionfruit along with sweet lime oil. 

The next course was a dry-aged ribeye steak from Anderson Ranch served with compound blue cheese butter, garlic mashed potatoes and candied carrots. In the bottom of the bowl was a luscious sauce that Kirsch said takes four days to make. That was paired with a savory Joel Gott Cabernet. 

A bonus sixth course came out as a surprise: thin slices of a Wagyu ribeye with pea puree and currant glaze topped with pickled fried onions. That course was paired with a light, refreshing Märzen beer.

The seventh and final dessert course was sourdough bread pudding with Baileys Irish cream foam and bacon tuile. This was paired with a mouthwatering small glass of Wizard Blend barrel-aged stout from Modern Times Beer in San Diego.

Commitment to fresh ingredients

Seasoned’s commitment to local ingredients runs deep. The restaurant receives deliveries from Upriver Organics weekly and the Kirsches visit Groundwork Organics every Sunday to select tomatoes, herbs and other produce. Kirsch just added a BLT using organic tomatoes from the two farms, along with bacon from Hill Meat Company in Pendleton. The restaurant’s partnership with Long’s Meat Market gives Kirsch access to a 60-day dry-aged New York strip steak that they spray with bourbon while it’s curing.

“It’s incredible,” Kirsch said.

Kirsch expresses gratitude at having access to such ingredients, and also the ability to be more refined with some of the things he’s offering on the Chef’s Table menu. For instance, the heirloom tomato soup is made in a careful and time-consuming way to remove the skin and seeds from each tomato.

“I’m able to hand-pick the tomatoes that I want to use for it, and make our own stocks, from scratch,” he said. “It turns into a beautiful, velvety soup” — one he wouldn’t be able to achieve if he had to make gallons, rather than 12 servings.

Kirsch is planning on switching up the next Chef’s Table menu in September. Kirsch said many of the customers who book Chef’s Table reservations are doing so to celebrate a special occasion.

“One guy who recently ate with us sold his house and wanted to celebrate,” Kirsch said. “With this concept, I expect that a lot of people will be coming in for special occasions. But then when you just want to try our food any time, you can come in and try the gastropub menu.”

Want to go?

Seasoned is inside Claim 52 Brewing
232 Lincoln St.
Sunday through Thursday: noon-9 p.m.
Friday and Saturday.: noon-10 p.m. 
541-654-2103
https://seasonednwb.com