As a restaurant, J’s BBQ has collected fans since it opened in 2014. But when owners Susan Reiterman and Jen Rintelmann and their son Jadon (the “J” in “J’s”) bottled and vacuum-packed their menu items for sale in a “country store” during the height of the pandemic, it proved a perfect testing ground for a pivot away from the stresses of the restaurant business. And now, with placements in 15 stores, vendor status with Sysco and agreements with a pair of Wisconsin-based co-packers, Ripon’s sauciest food entrepreneurs are poised this month to reinvent themselves as manufacturers.
The beloved restaurant closed its doors in December, but just in time for Memorial Day weekend the family will open J’s Sauce Hub in an adjacent storefront along Ripon’s Watson Street to sell and distribute locally made culinary products, including J’s bottled sauces. The first one off the line? “Kentucky White” — a concoction dreamed up on the fly at the request of a restaurant patron in 2014 that is now a hallmark of the J’s BBQ brand.
“It’s a universal condiment; it goes well with everything except candy,” Rintelmann says. “In our house, it’s a go-to grab. It’s not an Alabama white sauce. It’s not a barbecue sauce; it’s not a chutney … it’s not something that had already been in existence. It [had] never been done before, and we created that.”
And while Kentucky White is a signature creation, J’s BBQ has earned fans with a wide variety of sauces, homestyle side dishes and meats. J’s mac and cheese is the two-time Oshkosh Mac ’n Brew champion and something Reiterman says “grown men have asked to bathe in.” The dish’s famous, silky cheese sauce is among the items slated to be jarred by J’s BBQ.
Reiterman and Rintelmann say they plan to continually grow their selection of packaged offerings (yes, even meats), as well as the places where they are available. They also will appear at MeatFest May 20 in Green Bay.
“It’s already exciting,” Reiterman says. “It’s flabbergasting to see our product on shelves, to have Jadon walk into the grocery store and stand next to it, pointing at it. It’s a lot of proud moments.”
