[light banjo music]
- Angela Kelly: I see a lot of Southern restaurants do, like,
a little flair or a little twist.
I think that if you keep ingredients in a dish
to a minimum, then you're just expressing the flavor
of that dish; you're just pulling out
what it is about that that you want to share.
[upbeat bluegrass music]
[spoon playing] [upbeat bluegrass music]
I would say that's the hardest thing
about owning a business, is bossing people around.
I'm not bossy.
I don't mind instructing people how to do things,
but I don't like to tell them
that they're doing something wrong.
I came here to go to college.
And then moved away, worked for AmeriCorps for a little bit.
I moved back in 2000.
While I was in grad school,
I started baking for Espresso News
and really enjoying that job and realizing
that I was better at that than plant physiology,
decided that was where I felt like I needed to be.
I needed to be cooking food for people.
[upbeat bluegrass music]
Buying locally has always been a thing
that I've done here from the very beginning.
I've bought from a lot of farms, local farms in general.
One of my favorites is Full Moon Farm with Jacob and Kara.
I buy collard greens, salad mix, vegetables.
- Angela: Hey, y'all. - Kara: Hey, how's it going?
Welcome.
- Angela: Thank you; good to see you.
- Jacob: Good morning. - Good morning.
- Jacob: Thanks for coming out. - Thanks for having me.
- Jacob: Yeah. - Angela: Yeah.
- Kara: You wanna see the gardens?
- I do. - Kara: Awesome.
- Jacob: So, this is all of our salad mix
that we grow here.
- Angela: Wow, this is beautiful.
- Kara: Thanks.
- Angela: So, what varieties do we have here?
- Jacob: There's a red romaine, a green romaine,
and then just a leafy green and leafy red.
- Kara: Then we just cut it all at once,
put it in a box, and send it to you.
- Wow, it is gorgeous.
- Kara: Thanks.
- And I hear that you plow with horses.
- We do; we can go get the horses if you want to see them.
- I would love to. - Cool.
- Angela: When I get stuff locally, you know,
it's obviously fresher and tastes better.
You're building relationships with people
in your community, you're making friends,
and my customers appreciate it when I buy things locally.
They know it's better for them,
it's better for the economy, and the community.
- Kristi Bunn: Everything here's homemade,
and that's very uncommon.
I mean, everything is made from scratch,
down to our mayonnaise and ketchup.
We'll get phone calls sometimes,
people will ask about certain things like,
people come from Tennessee
because their daughter likes the tomato soup we make.
And like our hot dipped chicken, people love that.
They come in and realize that we have it on special
and then they'll come in and bring their friends at dinner
and then they'll come back at lunch the next day
and say, you know,
"You're not out of the hot dipped chicken yet, are you?"
[upbeat bluegrass music]
- Angela: I think about, like, my employees
and how close we are.
I feel like a lot of them are close friends now
because they met here, and it would've never happened
if they hadn't come here for a job.
People have asked why wouldn't I do this somewhere else
like Asheville or Charlotte.
I feel like it would work anywhere,
but I have a commitment to Boone and the community.
And while Proper has been here and running for eight years,
I'm not quite finished with it yet,
and I think Boone is a special place.
I want people to be themselves.
Whatever it was that they've dealt with for that day,
they can just come here, have a seat,
and let us take care of them.
My name's Angela Kelly, and I'm a Boonie.
[spoon playing] [upbeat bluegrass music]
- Announcer: Boonies is made possible
by the Watauga Economic Development Commission.
For a complete list of funders and to find out more,
visit www.artemisindependent.com.