This New Brunswick wine bar and liquor store was born from a storage space

Batch, Bin & Barrel, a new wine and liquor store in New Brunswick, began as a storage unit. But the pandemic helped it become so much more.

The bar at 98 Albany St., featuring a rotating, eclectic collection — as well as meats, cheeses and flatbreads — is the sister project of Steakhouse 85.

The restaurant's executive chef Brian Karluk remembers the chaos when indoor dining reopened in New Jersey at 25% capacity. That evening, the classic steakhouse saw big crowds — and people clamoring for tables that needed to stay empty to enforce social distancing.

“It felt like 1,000 people trying to come into the restaurant at once,” said Karluk, who has worked at Steakhouse 85 since its doors opened 15 years ago. “I remember our dining room managers and myself putting our heads together at 1 a.m. saying, ‘How can we do this better tomorrow?’ "

So Karluk called the restaurant’s landlord and asked if there was a space where they could store extra tables and chairs. The landlord showed him the narrow, vacant 2,000-square-foot space on Albany Street — and Karluk immediately envisioned much more than a storage unit.

Batch, Bin & Barrel opened on Jan. 6 as Karluk’s “baby,” he said. Its vibe doesn’t have much in common with the restaurant's dark wood and white-tableclothed aesthetic. Bright and modern, Batch, Bin & Barrel features a white granite countertop 12-seat bar, a reclaimed wood wall with the bar’s 300 wines and liquors, and scattered barrels where people can sip drinks and snack.

Visitors will find a rotating collection of wines and liquors that are “out of the way, a little different, small produced and on their way up,” Karluk said.

“You can come in every week and try a different scotch, bourbon, etc. And if you like it, you turn around and buy it off the wall.”

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Wines by the glass range from $10 to $19, wines by the bottle range from $15 to $200. Some of the most popular include the Charles Smith Kung Fu Girl Riesling and Squealing Pig Sauvignon Blanc — a far cry from Steakhouse 85’s usual big, bold reds. Batch, Bin & Barrel also offers about 20 New Jersey craft beers.

A menu of meats, cheeses and snacks pairs with the drinks, which will change seasonally — and continue the bar and liquor store’s philosophy of offering small-batch and small-produced items.

Right now, the best-selling item is the Vampire Slayer cow’s milk cheddar cheese from Calkins Creamery in Pennsylvania. It literally resembles a vampire’s cape as the cheese infused with garlic and ginger is covered in a black wax rind.

With an Italian meat slicer mounted to the bar, a freshly-sliced meat will always be offered. Today it's a 20-month-aged prosciutto di Parma. Soppressata or salami could follow.

“That slicer pulls off the most feathery, thin pillows of prosciutto,” Karluk said. “The mouthfeel on it is incredible."

A cheese accompaniment, as well as a nut and an olive marinade will also be on the menu. Sour cherry chutney cheese, five-spiced cashews and marinated olives with orange zest, fennel seed and rosemary are currently available.

Flatbread pizzas are also always on the menu, such as pepperoni with hot honey, and braised short rib with white truffle cheese.

In a town full of bars and restaurants, is there room for one more? Karluk thinks so. As one visitor told him last week, Batch, Bin & Barrel is a “good in-between bar.”

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“He told me, ‘New Brunswick has a lot of high-end restaurants with bars, but sometimes those are a little stuffy, and a lot of low-end bars, where younger kids are doing shots and getting rowdy. But this is the only in-between bar in town,’ “ Karluk recalled. “He said, ‘I’m 35 and I don’t want to do shots and I don’t want to have to get dressed up. I just want to come out with my wife and have a glass of wine and a snack.”

Go: Batch, Bin & Barrel at 98 Albany St, New Brunswick; 732-246-8587, batchbinbarrel.com.

Jenna Intersimone has been a staff member at the USA TODAY NETWORK New Jersey since 2014, after becoming a blogger-turned-reporter following the creation of her award-winning travel blog. To get unlimited access to her stories about food, drink and fun, please subscribe or activate your digital account today.

Contact: JIntersimone@MyCentralJersey.com

This article originally appeared on MyCentralJersey.com: New Brunswick: Batch, Bin & Barrel, a wine bar and liquor store, opens