Barn breakfast meet-and-greet builds bonds between city folks and farmers

Prying teenagers out of bed before the sun comes up is a chore most parents dread.

But Kristinah Henderson’s two teens, as well has her five-year-old son, answered the alarm without complaint when it sounded at 4:15 on Sunday, August 16.

The family was ready to board a chartered bus with about 50 other city folks as it left downtown Minneapolis at 6 am sharp. The bus traveled two and a half hours to their destination: the Schmidt family farm near Starbuck in rural west central Minnesota.

The busload of Twin Cities visitors arrived to enjoy an unforgettable outdoor culinary experience—breakfast featuring ingredients raised on the very farm where they would eat it.

“It’s been a while since I connected with nature like that and I definitely needed it,” said Henderson, a Community Service Officer with the Minneapolis Police Dept.

Henderson spends her work days in a squad car patrolling downtown streets. She said the opportunity to get out of the city felt like “a relaxing mini-vacation” for her family.

The bus trip to the farm-to-fork breakfast came courtesy of broadcaster and entrepreneur Sheletta Brundidge.

“Remember how much fun field trips were when we were kids, sitting on the bus with our friends and going someplace new?” asked Brundidge. “We need more family field trips.”

Brundidge, who owns the media and marketing firm ShelettaMakesMeLaugh, publishes an emailed “newsletta” with her humorous take on the news and her relatable family adventures; thousands of followers read it every day. 

To thank them for supporting her and her sponsors, Brundidge offered a free outing to readers who replied to take her up on her invitation.

“In that two and a half hour drive, I felt the collective blood pressure on the bus fall by ten points. Everyone was smiling like Christmas morning,” Brundidge said.

As guests spilled out of the bus, tables placed near the century old barn were set with zinnias in Mason jars awaited them. Guests sat down to platters of fresh-cracked eggs, homemade sausage, pancakes made from locally milled flour and locally produced maple syrup and honey. The ingredients were raised by the Schmidt family or on neighboring farms.

“We keep hearing how food we buy will make us sick; every time you turn on the news it’s about eggs recalled because of salmonella, lettuce that is contaminated. We got a breakfast with no preservatives or additives and everyone came home nourished and safe,” said Brundidge.

“I’ve been eating eggs all my life and I never tasted eggs so fluffy!”

Elecia Williams and her sister Sondra Rambo were pleased to take advantage of Brundidge’s invitation.

“We read the NewsLetta every day and we were so excited to go on the field trip; we’ve never done anything like this,” Williams said. “We loved having some sister time on such a beautiful day. And I had to buy some of that maple syrup to bring home.”

This agricultural experience was curated by The Crowded Table. Owned by spouses Matthew and Amber Jensen, the Alexandria-based business regularly sets up farm-to-table meals on farms in Greater Minnesota to give diners an opportunity to sample their fresh ingredients and build word-of-mouth on them.

“We want guests to make authentic connections with farmers. By bringing them out to taste locally sourced meals prepared right there on working family farms, they experience some of the amazing products Minnesota farmers are raising,” Matthew Jensen said.  

After breakfast, Sheletta’s guests toured the farm, meeting barn cats and the dairy herd and asking their farm family hosts to dish on their work.

“A teenager asked, what do you do when you go on vacation, who takes care of the farm? When the farmer said, we don’t go on trips, we all kind of gasped,” said Nneka Onuma.

The owner of bakery brand Sweet Heaven by Nne, Onuma said  observing the operation up close gave her a new perspective.

“As a baker, I use a lot of eggs. This gave me gratitude. Too often we don’t think about who makes it possible for food to be in our bellies. These are the families who get up early and work hard all day every day, no shortcuts,” she said.

Brundidge said she hoped the field trip left her guests with both sweet summer memories and a broader view of the farmers’ role in the food chain. 

That was certainly the case for Kristinah Henderson and her family.

“We don’t just get to just exist in nature with each other often enough. It was a such a good thing to do, to sit outside together and make that deeper connection with the land and our food,” Henderson said. “It fed our spirit.”