A longtime Bristol restaurant and inn makes way for a new one: The Tillerman is here.

BRISTOL – A restaurant and inn that had been in business since the late 20th century closed last spring. Its successor is here to begin a new long run.

What is The Tillerman?

After the Inn at Baldwin Creek and Mary’s Restaurant closed in May upon the retirement of owners Doug Mack and Linda Harmon, new owners Jason Kirmse and Kate Baron were ready to move in. In late October they opened The Tillerman, a restaurant, inn and events space off Vermont 116 on the north side of Bristol.

The couple plans to emphasize the inn-and-events side of the business and has truncated the restaurant operation; the number of seats in the farmhouse-like structure has shrunk from 108 in the days of Mary’s Restaurant to 43 now. The menu is more streamlined as well, geared toward diners sharing a variety of plates rather than ordering one large entrée.

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Kirmse said he and Baron aim for a “sensibility of simple food using the best ingredients that we could find given the season.”

The menu for the week of Jan. 24 featured snacks such as rosemary almonds, prosciutto cotto and oysters; a section labeled “greens & things” with mushroom soup, oven-roasted beets and spinach salad; and “wood-fired fare” including meatballs and four varieties of pizza flash-heated in the restaurant’s new wood oven.

The Tillerman also features what Kirmse calls an “eclectic” beer and wine menu. The restaurant is named for the couple’s favorite Cat Stevens album, 1970’s “Tea for the Tillerman.” That era’s vibe was plainly evident on a recent Thursday evening, when selections heard on The Tillerman’s sound system included Stevens as well as Bob Dylan, Warren Zevon and Neil Young. The restaurant also offers live music on Wednesdays.

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What’s the story behind The Tillerman?

Kirmse, originally from Florida's Fort Lauderdale area, and Baron, a native of Westchester County in New York, lived in northern California for 20 years. He owned one restaurant and was a partner in four others in San Francisco, and left the restaurant group he co-owned in 2019.

“We just wanted to start over,” Kirmse said. The couple planned to move to Spain in 2020; then the COVID-19 pandemic all but shut the world down. They were still in northern California that September when wildfires hit the area.

“We said, ‘Why the hell are we still here?’” Kirmse said. They searched for a place to land that fit their political ideology, had a good food system and an outdoorsy lifestyle. That search led them to Vermont, and more specifically, Addison County.

“It was just a feeling,” Kirmse said after the couple looked at Burlington, Stowe, Woodstock and Brattleboro before settling on Bristol. “It was just a small, quaint little town that was close enough to a city, being Burlington.” He said they also like that Bristol is near Middlebury, giving The Tillerman a couple of college towns from which to attract students and their parents looking for food as well as lodging at the six-room inn.

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Bristol also introduced Kirmse and Baron to their future chef. Justin Wright was running a weekly pop-up seafood operation on Main Street called the Caspian Oyster Depot when Kirmse and Baron met him around the time they moved to Vermont last March. Wright oversees the kitchen at The Tillerman while Kirmse and Baron can focus on the inn and events.

Kirmse said it’s not intimidating to take over the space that housed a popular, longtime restaurant. He said there’s little they haven’t seen from their time in the pressurized restaurant scene in the Bay Area.

“We did this on our own terms,” Kirmse said. “We feel pretty confident about what we’re doing, what we’re offering.”

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Hours and location

The Tillerman, 1868 Vermont 116, Bristol. 4:30-8 p.m. Wednesday-Saturday. (802) 643-2237, www.thetillermanvt.com

Contact Brent Hallenbeck at bhallenbeck@freepressmedia.com. Follow Brent on Twitter at www.twitter.com/BrentHallenbeck.