Kayte Billerman stands behind the counter at The Good Bite Kitchen in Lake Placid on Tuesday, July 30, a few days after announcing that the business would be put up for sale as she transitions into a new role at Small Town Cultures. (Photo provided — Elizabeth Izzo)

LAKE PLACID — The doors of a long-standing Lake Placid business will close at the end of next month.

The Good Bite Kitchen on Sentinel Road, operated by chef Kayte Billerman, is going up for sale as Billerman transitions into a new role in marketing and communications at her sister’s probiotic foods company, Small Town Cultures.

As Billerman seeks a buyer for The Good Bite Kitchen and for a person to take over the business’s lease, she hopes to continue to occasionally cook special-release meals, offer five-day “GBK Reboot” meal replacement plans and holiday menu pre-orders, host cooking classes and rent out the space to other small producers in need of a commercial kitchen. But as of Aug. 30, the business will be discontinuing its main heat-and-eat meal service.

Over the years, as Billerman has grown as a businesswoman and a chef, trying out different business models and creating new out-of-the-box culinary experiences, her regular customers have stayed by her side. It’s those customers who she will miss the most.

“I’ll definitely miss the customers. I’ll miss the creativity behind coming up with menus and just getting to see people, hearing, ‘oh, that soup was great,’ or ‘oh, I wish you still made that thing that you made four years ago.’ It’s just nice to converse about things that I produced kind of in an artist way, in art form, as food,” she said.

Kayte Billerman poses with parents Gail and Bill Billerman the night before The Good Bite Kitchen’s opening day on July 4, 2012. (Provided photo — Kayte Billerman)

Her customers will miss her, too.

Anita Estling has been a fan of Billerman’s creations since moving to the area in 2009. She remembers her food at the Saranac Lake Farmers Market, before Billerman moved into The Good Bite Kitchen’s first brick-and-mortar location on Main Street.

“When I heard she was opening her store on Main Street … I was so happy for her — and for the opportunity to have more access to her foods in the form of soups, sandwiches and take-home meals,” Estling said. “When she downsized the store and moved to its current location, I continued to enjoy her offerings, especially the pizzas.

“So many exotic flavor combinations I never would have thought of!” Estling added. “She made my son’s shepherd’s pie for his birthday last year because it’s his favorite. And we love her holiday offerings of breads and appetizers. While I’m thrilled for the opportunity she has to grow with her sister’s business, I really hope someone does step in to take over the business, although it’ll be hard to replicate that special Kayte touch — and her parents Gail and Bill’s contributions to the business shouldn’t be overlooked either!”

Bill built and maintained all of The Good Bite Kitchen locations and “never hesitated to help” when she needed him, Billerman said.

“My mom Gail has done everything from hands on help in the kitchen, to bouncing ideas off of to talking me off the edge when things got tough,” she added. “I could and probably should go on and on about them because I am truly lucky to have them in my corner.”

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“Went with the flow”

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The Good Bite Kitchen has seen a few transformations over the years. It started in 2012 as what Billerman describes as a “vegetarian lunch counter,” a tiny six-seat restaurant in a narrow storefront at 2501 Main St., next to Little Blue House. In 2018, the business became a meal kit service, and in 2022, The Good Bite Kitchen moved to Sentinel Road and transitioned to providing heat-and-eat meals.

“I just kind of went with the flow of the changes,” Billerman said. “I knew the landscape of Main Street and tourism was changing a little and I just felt that I wanted to do something more for local people. That’s kind of why I went to the meal kit system, thinking, ‘No one’s going to have to park on Main Street, so I’ll just deliver to them.’ That worked out well. Then it was COVID, and it was great because everyone wanted food delivered to their house.”

In a village known for its tourism, Billerman has in many ways designed her entire business to serve local people with food grown locally — that’s part of why the business moved to Sentinel Road, which still has a neighborhood feel, Billerman said, and is closer to neighborhoods where many full- and part-time residents live. The Sentinel Road location also offered somewhat of a return to in-person operations, with customers picking up meals at the kitchen.

Through all of The Good Bite Kitchen’s iterations, Billerman has sourced the bulk of the ingredients for her business from local farms, such as Harmony Hills Farmstead in West Monroe and Juniper Hill Farm in Wadhams.

She’s looking forward to now being able to support those farms at farmers markets and see those farmers in person, rather than opening her door and just accepting deliveries.

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Full circle

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The Good Bite Kitchen, at one point, also housed Small Town Cultures — founder Cori Deans, Billerman’s sister, once used the business’s Main Street kitchen to ferment her products before moving into a commercial kitchen space in Keene.

“She would come in on our off days — which were Sunday and Monday back then. Totally take over my little hallway kitchen, turn it inside out, make ferments,” Billerman said. “She made a little cellar in the basement, where she put all the food to ferment. They started there.”

Small Town Cultures is now distributing products nationwide. The business moved from Keene into a larger 4,000-square-foot warehouse space in Plattsburgh a few years ago to keep up with demand — Billerman expects the business to outgrow that warehouse soon, too.

Small Town Culture’s products were picked up by nationwide grocery chain Whole Foods in 2021, and in 2022, Fresh Market supermarkets started carrying its products. The products have now launched at Price Chopper, Market 32 and Tops. Later this year, the business’s products will launch in 500 Walmart stores. Local grocery stores, which supported the business early on — such as Nori’s Village Market in Saranac Lake and Cedar Run in Keene — continue to carry Small Town Cultures.

“They really are trying to be a company for all,” Billerman said. “It’s not just people that can afford to go to a Whole Foods and purchase their food that have a gut issue, it’s for everybody.”

Small Town Cultures was created after Deans was diagnosed with Crohn’s disease and decided to incorporate more fermented foods into her diet to try to flush out bad bacteria. She told the News in 2021 that Crohn’s disease can make it painful to eat and challenging to digest food properly. Her medication wasn’t working for her anymore, and even after extensive treatment doctors told her she’d likely go into remission. She decided to do her own research.

“Ten years on, now this is just a way of life,” Deans told the Lake Placid News in 2020. “I ferment, I eat it, I don’t have symptoms, and haven’t had symptoms for a while.”

Billerman’s new role at Small Town Cultures will be somewhat a return to what she’d studied to do when she left her hometown of Lake Placid to go to college.

“I had thought after moving down here that maybe in four or five years, I’d get back into marketing — it’s my degree from Northeastern University,” Billerman said Tuesday, standing in the kitchen at Good Bite. “This opportunity just presented itself now. I’m here, I’m cooking eight to 10 hours a day. I was looking for a little more leeway in my schedule and a little less tied to the location.”

Until Aug. 30, The Good Bite Kitchen will be open 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Tuesday through Friday. Those interested in ushering the kitchen into a new chapter can contact Billerman at kayte@thegoodbitekitchen.com.

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CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story included an incorrect last name for Kayte Billerman’s mother in a photo caption. The News regrets the error.