Seasoned Swine Is a Slow-Smoked Success Story

Jacob Viers launched Seasoned Swine as a food truck in 2017. Since then, it's added two brick-and-mortar locations — one in Golden in 2021 and another in the former Plates by the Pound space in Aurora last year. Now he's also slinging ’cue at Rocker Spirits in Littleton on Fridays and Saturdays. 

Viers grew up in Iowa and moved to Colorado in 2013, when he was 28 years old. "I vacationed here as a kid and always kind of felt like I wanted to move here," he says. "The way the air feels and smells out here, it's just completely different than Iowa. That's what really brought me out here: It was something different."

He'd been working as a bartender at Texas Roadhouse and was able to transfer to a Colorado location. "One day, we saw the food trucks down in Civic Center Park. Nose to tail, twenty-five to thirty trucks deep. I was like, 'Holy crap, wouldn't it be cool to own one of those?'" he recalls. "Didn't know it could come true, though."

He was dating a girl from Alabama when he fell in love with barbecue. "We went down there and I met her family. ... Her aunt had a big green egg and she was cooking pork butt — I must have had five pork sandwiches that night. I was so full, but that's one moment that kind of launched me down the path of starting my own thing," Viers explains.

On another trip, to Des Moines, "There was a place where I had ribs that were barbecued the right way, and that sent me down the path of wanting to create a rib that was tender, juicy and delicious," he adds.
Although it's fairly easy to fall in love with eating barbecue, preparing it is a different story. It requires years of experience and an endless pursuit of striving to master the art of smoking. While Viers had no experience making barbecue, he did have some basic cooking skills from spending time in the kitchen with his grandma as a kid. "She would always let me be in the kitchen with her and let me mess with the grill, too, even though I probably wasn't old enough," he says. "One of the earliest things I can remember was grilling this pounded-out chicken. I drizzled it in honey and sprinkled cayenne powder all over it. I don't know why, but that's the earliest thing I can remember. You know, getting down and funky on the grill."

Viers began practicing smoking meats on a Big Green Egg in his backyard and slowly started inviting people over for family dinners on Sundays. "On the back patio, we had some patio furniture and a table, and we all sat out there and got down on some pork butt and did that regularly," Viers says. "Then I thought to myself, 'Why am I only feeding ten people right now?' There's a need for barbecue here in the city."

He began actively searching for a truck, and after tirelessly checking Craigslist every morning for months, he finally stumbled across an old Hostess truck with 160,000 miles going for $5,400 and decided to bring it home.

After he narrowly escaped being screwed over by Larry Perez, a notorious food truck builder that ripped off dozens of businesses, Viers officially launched Seasoned Swine in June 2017.
Nearly seven years in, Viers is enthusiastic about the growth of his business and the opportunity to expand his clientele, though he admits that "the most challenging part is growth and managing people — building the culture and making sure that everyone understands the culture in the restaurant and what we're after. The main goal is to get everybody on the same page."

On Saturdays only, Seasoned Swine serves one of Viers's favorite items — "the Creekstone Farms beef rib. It's as big as my head," he says. He's also partial to the pulled-pork nachos and the dry-rubbed, cherry-smoked wings.

"We're bringing the heat to the Denver barbecue scene, and we don't feel like we're going anywhere anytime soon," Viers concludes. "Everyone needs to know that everybody is welcome, and we can't have something like this without people coming in the doors. ... Let's party!"

For more information, including hours, catering info and online ordering, visit seasonedswine.com.