{"id":42471,"date":"2022-01-29T04:41:14","date_gmt":"2022-01-29T11:41:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/former-mancos-teacher-reflects-on-success-of-new-food-business\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T03:07:33","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T09:07:33","slug":"former-mancos-teacher-reflects-on-success-of-new-food-business","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/former-mancos-teacher-reflects-on-success-of-new-food-business\/","title":{"rendered":"Former Mancos teacher reflects on success of new food business"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"Food
Food trucks, such as Kelly's Kitchen, operate in Dolores under a new ordinance. (Courtesy Kelly's Kitchen)<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

It was a rhubarb crisp that set Kelly Gregory\u2019s dream in motion.<\/p>\n

She saw a woman selling it while strolling the Dolores Farmers Market in June 2020, and thought to herself, \u201cI could sell something.\u201d<\/p>\n

She realized she wanted to own a culinary business at age 21.<\/p>\n

Back then, she pictured herself launching a coffee shop, cooking catering orders or managing food in any way, really.<\/p>\n

She had the skills, and, perhaps more important, the passion, to do it.<\/p>\n

Besides her loyalty to Bon Appetit magazine, which stemmed from her teenage years, she catered at a Hewett Packard Plant in Fort Collins and at the Inverness Hotel in Denver. As a student at Colorado State University, she cooked in the dorms.<\/p>\n

\u201cI worked in almost every variety of food service there is except being an actual waitress,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

With her degree in exercise science, she worked in cardiac and pulmonary rehabilitation, before obtaining her master\u2019s in environmental education. She was a science teacher at Mancos Middle School.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think that the interest in the culinary arts was just always there,\u201d she said. \u201cBut I kind of went in these different directions that were supposed to be the responsible day job with the benefits package,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

However, food, health and creativity in the culinary arts remained pillars of Gregory\u2019s identity.<\/p>\n

Fast-forward to the summer of 2020, and Gregory was brainstorming products she thought would sell at the local farmers market.<\/p>\n

Two weeks later, licensed and printed food labels in tow, she made her debut with salsa fresca hummus, kimchi and cupcakes.<\/p>\n

Gregory\u2019s first employee, her niece, Ava, helped conceptualize cupcake flavors and loyally attended every farmer\u2019s market in 2020.<\/p>\n

\"Kelly's
Kelly's Kitchen\u2019s products at the Winter Market at Four Seasons Greenhouse and Nursery on display in December 2020. (Courtesy Kelly\u2019s Kitchen)<\/span>Courtesy Kelly Gregory<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

The owner of the Dolores River Brewery approached her about offering appetizers on Thursdays. Appetizers evolved into tacos, and tacos soon spurred a pop-up restaurant in the brewery\u2019s kitchen.<\/p>\n

In May 2021, Kelly\u2019s Kitchen, as it became known, secured its own food trailer.<\/p>\n

Now, the likes of Thai curry, Asian slaw, loaded tacos and grilled cheese melted with green chiles and fresh tomato are mainstays on Gregory\u2019s menu.<\/p>\n

On Wednesdays and Thursdays, she\u2019s stationed at the Dolores River Brewery, and on Fridays she visits Fenceline Cidery in Mancos. Her products are also available in FB Organics and the Dolores Food Market.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe business is always kind of growing,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Her favorite dish to eat is the pork street taco, featuring pork shoulder slow-cooked in New Mexico red chile.<\/p>\n

\"Gregory\u2019s
Gregory\u2019s favorite: the pork street taco with spicy crema. (Courtesy Kelly\u2019s Kitchen)<\/span>Josh Maule<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Her favorite dish to make, however, is the mojo de ajo taco \u2013 a blend of mushrooms, onions, poblanos, sweet peppers and jalapenos sauteed in garlic mojo and blanketed in a tortilla and assorted toppings.<\/p>\n

\u201cTotal carnivores absolutely love this taco,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Gregory\u2019s four-person team gets a lot done. For the majority of the day on Tuesdays, her crew can be found in the Dolores Community Center Kitchen, and borrowing the Dolores River Brewery\u2019s kitchen on Mondays and Wednesdays.<\/p>\n

Output varies between the winter and summer, she said.<\/p>\n

Last week, Kelly\u2019s Kitchen created 43 pounds of salsa, 225 tacos, 30 sandwiches and 12 bowls of curry.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

In the summer, the numbers are closer to 600 tacos and 48 chicken katsu sandwiches, which sometime sell out in two hours.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe do a lot of moving stuff around, and it\u2019s taxing, but they\u2019re wonderful, dedicated people that I just am so grateful for,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Gregory grew up in a primarily Hispanic Denver neighborhood, and it was there that she received much of the inspiration she channels today to craft tacos.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was all about making your own tortillas and beans and green chili. So even though I don\u2019t have that on my menu, that was probably the first things that I learned to make,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

She moved to Southwest Colorado working for her brother\u2019s graphic design business.<\/p>\n

\u201cAfter 24 years, it\u2019s definitely home,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

She\u2019s grateful for the complimentary feedback from the community.<\/p>\n

\u201c I know that there are lots of tacos to be had in Montezuma County, but people will leave, and they\u2019ll say, \u2018That\u2019s the best taco I have ever had,\u2019\u201c she said.<\/p>\n

Gregory experiments with new dishes. Any time a new menu offering premieres, it\u2019s the most popular, she said.<\/p>\n

Gregory\u2019s business has evolved with the changing landscape of the pandemic. Looking to the future, she hopes to be able to cater more events, she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cNot only have I been able to serve creative food to my community, I\u2019ve been able to create some jobs that didn\u2019t previously exist and get some money in some people\u2019s pockets, and it seems like it\u2019s only going uphill,\u201d Gregory said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Kelly\u2019s Kitchen is in its second year of business, and it\u2019s booming <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":42472,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[431,438,439,28,167,29],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-42471","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-business-general","tag-food","tag-food-drink","tag-headlines","tag-local-news-lead","tag-newsletter"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42471","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42471"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42471\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":85347,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/42471\/revisions\/85347"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/42472"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42471"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=42471"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=42471"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=42471"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}