Saucy business

View larger image Dennis Flynn, owner of Setter Mountain Food Group, measures ingredients as he prepares a barbeque sauce. — Dennis Grundman/Daily View larger image Flynn pours an ingredient into a pan on a scale in preparation of making his barbeque sauce. View larger image Setter Mountain products are shown. — Dennis Grundman View larger image A bottle of Setter Mountain Moonshiners B.B.Q. Sauce. — Dennis Grundman/Daily

Local chef builds home-based company selling jellies, marinades

By Jessica Wiant -- jwiant@nvdaily.com

FRONT ROYAL -- Already mapping out gift ideas for next Christmas? Take note of Setter Mountain Food Group.

The at-home business founded by Dennis Flynn and his wife, Gail, has reported a booming Christmas sales season for its sauces and jellies -- and they're already gearing up for a busy 2012.

It was while snowed in during winter 2009 that Flynn, a retired chef, first started mapping out a plan to produce and market his own sauces.

Two years later, the Flynns have behind them two busy, hot summers of hosting barbecues at regional wineries, a full product line and deals with several wineries to make exclusive branded jellies out of their wines. Several regional stores offer Setter Mountain sauces and jellies and they are also available online at www.settermountain.com.

Flynn makes all the stuff -- two barbecue sauce varieties, a marinara sauce, several wine jellies and an apple jelly -- in the commercial kitchen he set up in the basement of their Front Royal home. Outside the kitchen, he joked, is packing, shipping, receiving and all the other elements of an at-home business.

"Welcome to the basement of my house," he said. "You never work harder than working for yourself."

Flynn's barbecue and marinara recipes are ones he's honed over years working as a chef up and down the East Coast and helping out at friends' parties.

Setter Mountain -- named for the Flynns' white-and-black dog, Finn -- got it's real start in summer 2010 catering barbecues at Rappahannock Cellars on the weekends, Flynn and his wife agreed.

Visitors would come for the wine, try the barbecue and it would be no time before Flynn would see that "ooh aah" moment when people tasted his food.

"Usually it's a loud smacking of lips," Mrs. Flynn said.

Looking for a way to round out their product line, the Flynns saw wine jellies, which Mrs. Flynn said she first experienced as a child when her parents received a gift basket with some, as a natural fit due to their location in Virginia wine country.

They experimented with recipes and now use wines from 10 to 15 regional wineries, some exclusively branded for a winery and available on-site and others featuring only the Setter Mountain brand name.

They make both red -- Merlot, Meritage Red, Cabernet Franc, as examples -- and white varieties of the jellies which they say work great with cheese and crackers as a snack or in recipes such as a glaze for pork tenderloin.

Their Spicy Apple Jelly, Mrs. Flynn said, is nicknamed "apple pie without the crust." With all the orchards nearby, apple seemed another natural choice for a flavor, she explained.

Luckily, Flynn's background as a chef made many of the hurdles of start-up not so daunting. He was used to working with food service reps, for example, and was better able to figure out administrative details, legalities, health department issues and label requirements, to name a few.

"He came with such a wealth of knowledge," Mrs. Flynn said.

Of course, that knowledge came in just as handy with the actual cooking. Each batch of each product needs to stay entirely consistent in order for Setter Mountain to be successful, according to Flynn.

"If it's not what they remember, they'll never buy it again," he said. So, he keeps his ingredients down to a science, and that's perhaps the most true with the wine jellies.

The Flynns use a tool called a refractometer to measure the sugar levels in each batch. If it isn't perfect, Flynn explained, the jelly won't set.

It's a process Flynn is getting used to. When he isn't out on the road pitching Setter Mountain to different stores and vineyards, he's at home, whipping up batches of the products, usually to the tune of 3 to 4 cases of each product in a week.

But that isn't the only cooking going on at the Flynn house. The couple -- and their friends -- do lots of experimenting with Setter Mountain products in their cooking, and Mrs. Flynn has even put together a recipe book using their sauces and jellies.

Recently they marinated tuna steak in their "mop and slop" sauce and grilled it.

"And nothing could be simpler," Mrs. Flynn said.

In 2012, Flynn hopes to focus more on food shows and finding different retailers to carry Setter Mountain.

For now, Setter Mountain can be found at Pagemaster Books in Front Royal and the Giving Tree in Linden. For more information, go online to www.settermountain.com.

Smokey Meatloaf
Ingredients:
2 pounds ground beef
2 eggs beaten
6 ounces seasoned bread crumbs
1 package onion soup mix
1/2 cup Setter Mountain Smokey Bourbon BBQ Sauce, divided in half

Mix all of the listed ingredients together in a bowl with 1/4 cup of Seter Mountain Smokey Bourbon BBQ Sauce. Form a loaf shape. Place an ungreased 13-by-9 inch pan and pour remaining sauce on top. Bake for an hour or until internal temperature reaches 160 degrees.