Walnut Creek has a new high-end nautical speakeasy bar, complete with an extravagant orca mural and tables lit by candlelight.
Luna Sea Lounge, which opened this week at 121 Pringle Ave., is a collaboration between Luna Sea Vodka founder Deven Wek and Auburn’s Kyle Wells, an Air Force pararescueman, who met at cocktail bar in Guatemala six years ago. Wek had been traveling and looking for interesting ingredients for his distillery — he’d learned the craft from his Ukrainian-born father. The two Californians spent the evening drinking vodka, playing chess and dreaming of a bar of their own.
Today, Wek runs an award-winning vodka distillery in Santa Cruz, whose offerings include a color-changing vodka made with butterfly pea flowers that shifts from blue to purple in the presence of citrus. And the new bar opened this week.
Luna Sea Lounge, which seats about 50 people, evokes a luxury speakeasy vibe, Wek says, with walnut accents, high ceilings and Venetian plaster walls — plus “an insane selection of all the different spirits,” he says. “Our cocktail menu is where we really have fun.”
The craft cocktails use housemade juices, so you’ll find a Sting Ray, made with Luna Sea vodka, pineapple, serrano pepper and citrus, while a Carrot Head is made with mezcal, carrot, ginger and lime. Need a nosh? The bar offers ceviche, charcuterie and cheeseboards — featuring Point Reyes Farmstead cheese — and on weekends, oysters.
Details: Open from noon to 8 p.m. Monday-Tuesday and 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. Wednesday-Sunday at 121 Pringle Ave. in Walnut Creek; lunasealounge.com.
Source: www.mercurynews.com