Black Diamond Barbeque, Kith and Kin Interview
Kith (n.) one's friends, acquaintances, and relations.
Kin (n.) one's family and relations.
Kith and Kin is an initiative to highlight member businesses.
Name of Company: Black Diamond Barbeque
Name of Owner: Jason Pacioni
Location, website, email, phone: 639 Morristown Corners Rd, Morrisville, VT 05661, (802) 888-2275, blackdiamondbbq.com
Description of your business/work? We are a barbeque themed restaurant. We cook all our meat with wood fire, focus on craft beers and craft cocktails, and are located in an historic building.
How long have you been in business? I’ve had the catering company since 2004 and opened the restaurant in October 2016.
How did you move to Morristown? The business was in Elmore and we outgrew our location in Elmore. This place became available and the building was already somewhat set up for a food operation.
What do you like best about Morristown? I like that it is a small enough town where you know other business people in town and I like that you get to see some of the same people on a fairly regular basis. We have a lot of regulars that patronize us on a weekly basis.
What new business would you like to see move to town? If MoCo opens, that would be pretty exciting.
What is on your wish list for the next five years of your business/career? I’d like to have a second location. In this location, I’d like to put in an outdoor pavilion that people could rent out for parties. It would be a fire pit and a cover for the rain, similar to one you’d see at a state park.
Personal background: I grew up in upstate New York and studied business management at Ithaca College. I moved to Vermont to be in the mountains and started doing barbeque as a hobby and clearly it became a full time job. I grew up working in restaurants and came from a family that loved to cook.
What was your first job? A paper boy and mowing my neighbor’s lawn.
What was your most fun job? What I’m doing now, the catering.
Favorite quote? “If you can’t say something nice, don’t say it all.” My dad used to say it to me all the time.
If you could have dinner with one person dead or alive, who would it be and why? Anthony Bordain, a retired New York city chef and writer. His writing is hilarious and also educational. I feel like we have a lot of very similar ideas on food.
What book did you read last? The Man Who Ate Everything by Jeffery Steingarten
Wild card? I really hope that at the local level, in Vermont, they could try and figure out the opiate problem. It needs to be done on a national level but I would hope a state like Vermont could figure it out.
