A few months ago, chef/owners Nate Wright and Lisa Fennimore Wright of Marble Valley Kitchen Deli & Catering, located at 22 Killington Ave., addressed the “state of the kitchen” on Facebook: “[We]wanted to take a moment to let you all know some exciting news coming from our kitchen: No, we're not closing! Quite the opposite, in fact.”
The restaurant will be open for lunch from February 2022 and for catering from April 2021. The post caused uproar among people who have seen many of their favorite restaurants close in recent years, but the Wrights are trying to change with the times.
Last weekend, they sat down to discuss the restaurant's future, having just finished renovating the dining area and counter space.
“When we first opened, we spent the first two years getting to know the community and asking questions,” Nate says, “Then we reworked our business model to better give people what they wanted, so in June we'll be opening for dinner, which is something people have been asking for.”
Nate, a Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania native, and Lisa, a New Jersey native, met in Vermont while working in the restaurant industry in the early 2000s. Lisa attended the former New England Culinary Institute and taught in the culinary arts program at Stafford Technical Center for 10 years. Nate attended the former International Culinary Academy in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
“She's more of a pastry chef and I'm more of a cook,” Nate says, “so that's one of the reasons we're able to split the work and come at things from different sides.”
As a latchkey kid of Gen X, Nate spent many summers alone with his sister. “There were only so many dinners you could make in the microwave, so I started cooking, watching cooking shows, reading cookbooks, and just fell in love with cooking,” he says.
“My grandmother's family has had great cooking skills for generations,” he says. “My dad's side of the family is from the South, so we have a really flavoursome food culture. My mum's side of the family is from Wales, so it's a lot of fresh, simple cooking.”
Opening their own restaurant had always been a dream for them, and the changes happening now were entirely expected. It all started just before COVID-19 hit, when they both had begun to become disillusioned with the industry as a whole.
“I'm a senior executive and I know finances,” says Nate, “and it was really hard watching them serve 300 $100 meals a night and panicking because I was worried about feeding my kids. And I would ask my bosses to pay these people more and they'd always say they didn't have the money, but they were driving new Mercedes.”
“I decided I had to do it my way,” he says. “If someone is going to work for me, I'm going to pay them a living wage because they're going to work hard. This is very demanding work, not just physically, but socially and mentally.”
Between the deli and catering, their work days add up to at least 12 hours, but it's clear they're doing something they love and are excited about the change.
“Since I started this business, it's continued to evolve,” Lisa said.
“As we evolve, this will grow with us,” Nate said. “You have to be able to change with the times, and times are changing really quickly.”
The company just announced a new summer lunch menu that includes a vegetarian Chaffee Melt, a grilled pesto chicken sandwich and a corned beef Reuben, while a new dinner menu launching in early June (check out its website, www.marblevalleykitchen.com, the company says) will feature rib-eye ravioli with French onion sauce, Atlantic salmon filet with maple-walnut pesto and a Southwest flan salad, all available for dine-in or takeout.
“People come home from work and they want to grab something quick and not have to think about it that night, and that's who we're trying to target,” Nate said.
If he had to choose a specialty dish, Nate said, “My bread and butter is home cooking. I love my grandma's recipes.” The menu also features dishes like lasagna and mac and cheese, but with an upscale twist. “We don't want them to be so upscale that the prices are exorbitant, but we want to make them a little more elevated so that it's worth the effort to come and visit us,” Nate said.
“The best compliment I ever received was when one of my regular customers said my whoopie pies were the closest they'd ever tasted to their grandmother's,” Lisa says. “That's our goal. We want to be just like grandma.”
It hasn’t been an easy journey, but recent changes have renewed their drive and dedication.
“Everything we've done for this business has been completely self-funded,” Nate says, “so there's a long timeline as we have to wait until we have the funding to move forward.”
“There aren't many small business lending terms available for family-owned grocers like ours, so this has been a labor of love, creative thinking and we've had to do it completely out of our own pockets,” he wrote on Facebook.
Other changes include soon-to-be-added seating beneath the front windows, private dining options and counter space for cooking classes. In the past, the space has hosted pasta-making classes, baking classes and a campfire cookout collaboration with local nonprofit Come Alive Outside.
“This really seemed to resonate with people, and we took that feedback and designed it to better accommodate these classes,” Nate says. “Now we have a clear separation between the front and back, and we can set up a private dining area for 20 people.”
“This space gives us the opportunity to host many more interesting community events,” Lisa says. “The city needs more places to relax, and we want people to feel that way when they're here.”
“We want our customers to leave with a smile on their face and a full stomach,” says Nate, and with freshly baked strawberry rhubarb turnovers, iced star cookies, and chicken and broccoli Alfredo coming out of the kitchen every day, that seems easy to do.
