BENNINGTON — The latest business venture run by the mother-daughter team of Joan and Anique Gilpin will have the ribbon cut at its grand opening on Monday.
Island Flavor, a take-out restaurant, offers dishes from the Gilpins’ native Jamaica. The store had its soft opening last week, September 19th.
“Business has been good,” Joan Gilpin said recently.
“I had lunch there and it was awesome,” said Jenny Dewar, executive director of Better Bennington Corp.
The Better Bennington Corp. will hold a ribbon cutting at the official opening of Island Flavor on Monday at 11 a.m. This event is free and open to the public.
The restaurant is open Sunday through Friday from 11 a.m. to 9 p.m., although Gilpin said hours could be adjusted after assessing demand in the first few weeks of operation. It will never open on Saturdays, she explained, because the family members are Seventh-day Adventists.
Island Flavor is located at 512 Main St. Nix Variety, 514 Main, is the Gilpins’ merchandise store, which sells an assortment of clothing and household items. The variety store opened in May last year.
The division of labor is the same in Island Flavor as when Nix Nax Variety launched: Joan Gilpin is the owner and Anique Gilpin is the manager. The two have spent most of their time in the restaurant and wander around the variety store on the side when needed.
“We now have someone in Nix Nax, so we can focus on Island Flavor,” Joan Gilpin said. “A few other family friends have been helping out right now because it’s hard to get someone to work.”
There isn’t much synergy between an epicurean business and a clothing and haberdashery business. As such, the Gilpins do not consider Island Flavor to be an affiliate of Nix Nax Variety. The two stores are like apples to oranges, and the managers understand that customers from one might never visit the other.
Plus, the restaurant has a shot at becoming a Jamaican outpost in southern Vermont.
“We opened this because we thought it would be nice to bring a little different food to Bennington,” Joan Gilpin said.
“I’m particularly excited about this because it’s a different cuisine,” said the BBC’s Dewar. “It’s not burgers and pizza.”
Island Flavor’s menu features Jamaican specialties including jerk chicken, chicken curry and chicken stew. There is also oxtail and goat curry.
Jamaican patties — the pastry-like pastries that contain beef and other fillings — will soon be added, Gilpin said, after a shipment arrived from his food distributor.
Prices range from $12 to $20.
And what about the authenticity of the food? The owner of Island Flavor was sure her fellow Jamaicans would approve of what happened on the restaurant counter.
“If you say you’re introducing people to your culture, it doesn’t make sense to change the taste to something more like they’re used to,” Gilpin said. “It’s authentic Jamaican food.”
