There’s a stereotype out there that kids don’t like vegetables. But why? A lot of veggies would seem to make them right up kids’ alley: they’re colorful, sometimes a little dirty, often sweet, with great textures that make them irresistible to touch. These are the very things that a Minneapolis organization called Midwest Food Connection emphasizes to help teach kids the ABCs of food. I had the pleasure of tagging along with two of their instructors earlier this week to photograph a few classes in action.

Midwest Food Connection instructors visit Twin Cities classrooms throughout the year. What they bring is raw food that kids can touch, smell, and taste. They tell stories about how root cellars were the grocery stores 100 years ago, and explain things like how rolled oats are made. Meanwhile the instructors use the oldest trick in the book to gain attention: free food. Like a kale, rutabaga, and leek stew. The leek smelled amazing as it simmered throughout the class, and was a huge hit when it was time to dig in.

Given how complex the American food market has become over the past half century, and how food choices are being linked to an ever-growing list of diseases, it’s great that organizations like Midwest Food Connection are stepping in to the void to get our children thinking about food early. So often the connection between raw ingredients and finished ‘food product’ are entirely lost; only through education and hands-on exposure to real food will we as a society retain our food values. I’m so happy to be able to help them tell their story.

One of the better things to happen in the past year for my wife and me has been the relocation of our local grocery store, the Seward Coop. Not only is it only three blocks from us now; it’s also twice as big, with amazing all-Minnesota meat counter (with the best hand made sausages in the city), a great deli, amazing selections of the whole world of organic and sustainable food. Basically it’s everything we want in a place to buy our food.

Which is one of the reasons I’m so excited to be working with them on their imagery – you can see the first newsletter I shot for them in PDF form here. The other reasons to be excited: great people who are fully willing to collaborate on the vision of a story, a mission that I wholeheartedly believe in right in my backyard, and amazing layout and branding provided by Spunk Design Machine.

Our first project was a backyard barbecue to highlight the August Eat Local promotion.

For you photog-types out there, a note on the lighting. I was absolutely excited about the evening sun blaring in from behind, but using only natural light would either have blown out the background and washed out the vivid color on the table, or left everything not the sky way under-exposed. So I set my base exposure to where I wanted the background to be, then I set two speedlights back from the near corners of the table to provide fill. The sweet spot was an exposure that gave highlights from the strong backlighting, with just enough fill to give detail and max color on the table and on peoples’ faces. The two speedlights were set to identical power, providing an even field of light over the table and subjects, giving me the ability to change my angle and not have to worry about resetting the lights. Then I could concentrate on composition and directing the subjects.