During our vacation in the Glacier Lakes region of West Central Minnesota earlier this summer, we found out that there was a brew pub in the small town of New London, the sister city to Spicer which were about five miles apart. And upon visiting the brew pub, we found out that they had a farm-to-fork restaurant with locally sourced foods attached to the place. The restaurant happened to be closed the first time we went to the brew pub, but we went back the next day to give it a try. Here are two of the more memorable places we went to during our vacation - Goat Ridge Brewing Company and Model Citizen - the Restaurant.
Josh Reed grew up on his family's farm outside of Brooten, MN. Learning about helping and maintaining the environment while working on the farm led Reed to study natural resource management at Western Washington University. After college, he landed an environmental resource gig with the federal government that kept him the Pacific Northwest. Reed loved the areas craft beers and in the mid-90's he started to brew his own beer at home, even raising some of the hops he would eventually use in his beers.
Reed married a young lady from Brooten by the name of Christa Otteson and the couple lived in the Seattle area for a handful of years, but had a hankering to move back to Minnesota at some point to raise a family. After much conversation and planning, Reed and Otteson moved back to the Brooten area in 2010 and lived on a homestead that had been in Otteson's family for years. The acreage sat on a glacial ridge they nicknamed Goat Ridge and it was there where Reed - who was working for a non-profit organization upon his return to Minnesota - started to grow hops that he would sell to various brewpubs around Minnesota. But his dream was to one day have his own brewpub where he could share his beers with the public.
Reed started working on a business plan and found that it was sort of difficult to come up with the proper paperwork for the plan. Then fate intervened where at a gathering in Brooten, Reed met Kelly Asche, a community and economic development director whose wife also grew up in Brooten. Reed and Asche found that they both had a love for homebrewing and when Reed told Asche that he was trying to come up with a business plan to one day present to the bank for a business loan, but he was having some difficulty with it. Asche agreed to look at the business plan and after some tweaks here and there, he told Reed he could help with the financing in the venture with his community development contacts. The two formed a partnership with Reed as the head brewer in the new project with Asche as his assistant brewer.
After quitting his job at the non-profit in October of 2014, Reed found a building along the bank of the Middle Fork of the Crow River that ran through New London, MN. It was an 1800 square foot building that had been a variety of businesses in the past including a car repair shop. Reed, Asche and Otteson renovated the building using reclaimed barn boards and using repurposed furniture for tables and chairs. With the brew tanks up and running in early 2015, Goat Ridge Brewing Co. opened their doors in April of that year.
The nano-brewery is located on Central Ave. W. in New London, just west of State Highway 9 that is the main north-south road through New London. (see map) Head-in parking is available on the street next to Goat Ridge, but a municipal lot is just across the street. The bar is to the left as you come into the place. We took a seat at the bar and a young lady greeted us. We took a look at the beers they had to offer that day - Goat Ridge changes beers pretty regularly - and I ended up getting their Kolsch, a great summertime beer. (Actually, I think a Kolsch is a good beer at any time of the year.) My wife tried a couple of their beers in a sampler size - a New England IPA that was a little too fruity for her taste, but she ended up liking the Smash Mosaic, a forward hopped flavored IPA that was actually pretty good. In fact, for my second beer I went with the Smash Mosaic. And I thought it was a pretty good deal, too, as a 20 ounce pour of Goat Ridge's beers were $6 bucks.
Out back is a pretty good sized beer garden that featured picnic tables and Adirondack chairs that looked out onto the Middle Fork of the Crow River. The water rushes past the beer garden coming from the Mill Pond Dam which holds water from the Middle Crow for some nice little connected lakes and ponds around the very picturesque town of New London. At one end of the beer garden was a small stage for live music at Goat's Ridge. I was somewhat amazed to see that they were going to have Chris Duarte - a very good blues guitarist who I've seen a handful of times in the past, primarily at Summerfest in Milwaukee - playing there. Unfortunately, it was going to be on that Saturday night and we would be making our way back home when he was there. But I was impressed that they could get talent like Chris Duarte to play there.
There's an addition off to the side of the tap room and just behind the outdoor stage. A small local political group was having a meeting in there when we were there that evening. Later on, after they left, we saw a family in there playing one of the board games that Goat Ridge keeps in or near the room. It was kind of a whimsical space with mismatched chairs, old drapes and even an old church pew on which to sit.
Directly behind the bar is the brew room. Glistening brew tanks stood tall in the very clean facility. The room had that sort of malty and hoppy fragrance to it.
Seated at the bar, we were befriended by a young couple who had a lake home on Green Lake in Spicer, but their primary home was in Willmar, about 15 miles away. They had sent their kids off to church camp and were having their own vacation at their lake home. My wife recognized them from the night before when we were sitting out by the dock at Zorbaz in Spicer and they pulled up in their pontoon boat. My wife made small talk with them as they were leaving later on - I don't remember because I was on my 4th mai tai at that point. But the woman told us, "We had just pulled out of the dock at Zorbaz and I told him (her husband), 'You know, those people look like they would be fun on a boat ride.' We came back to see if you wanted a boat ride, but you were already walking away." I told her that it was probably a good idea that we didn't go on the boat ride as I was pretty popped from all the mai tais I had. They were really fun to talk to and gave us some good recommendations on places to go and do and see - as well as some other bars and restaurants - in the area
They had actually come in to have dinner that night at Model Citizen, the farm-to-fork restaurant attached to Goat Ridge Brewing Co. We had looked the place up on line before we got up there and the web site said they would be closed that evening as they were extending some days off after the Fourth of July holiday. But Model Citizen was open the next day and we went there for a late lunch/early dinner.
Josh Reed wanted to expand his taproom and possibly put in a restaurant. But he didn't have any experience running a restaurant, nor did his wife. At the same time, it turned out that a couple of young chefs in the Twin Cities, Mateo Mackbee and Erin Lucas, were looking for a change of scenery, a more simpler way of making food rather than the high-end cuisine they had been involved with for years. Once again, it was divine intervention - this time helped out by a man of the cloth from the New London area - that brought Reed and Otteson together with Mackbee and Lucas.
Mateo Mackbee had a long resume of working as a chef for some of the finest restaurants in the Twin Cities. Erin Lucas was a Culinary Institute of America-trained pastry chef who met Mackbee when they were both working at Mozza Mia, an upscale wood-fired pizza place in the Minneapolis suburb of Edina. Lucas and Mackbee both liked to prepare and eat naturally-raised foods and they harbored a dream of one day owning their own small place that made and served locally grown foods to patrons, while also teaching young teens the ins-and-outs of a farm-to-fork restaurant. A chef with Mackbee's background usually finds someone who likes what he does and backs him in a restaurant. But that wasn't happening with him - Mackbee was a black man in the culinary world of predominantly white males.
It was one evening when Mackbee was sitting at a bar in the Twin Cities when a man came in and sat down next to him. It turned out that the man was a Lutheran minister - Pastor Mark Kopka from the Nordland Lutheran Church which is located between Paynesville, MN and Spicer, MN, not far from New London. Mackbee and Kopka talked at length that evening about their hopes and dreams. Kopka and Mackbee kept in touch with one another over the next four years and it was Pastor Kopka who became the intermediary in getting Mackbee and Lucas in touch with Josh Reed.
Pictured at right - Josh Reed, Erin Lucas and Mateo Mackbee. Photo courtesy West Central Tribune.
Pastor Kopka knew that Reed wanted to expand and add a space for a restaurant, but he didn't have anyone available to run it. But he also knew that Mackbee and Lucas were looking for an opportunity. Finally, Kopka went to the couple and told them that he had an offer - he was able to procure some land near New London that the two of them could use to raise their own organic produce, and that there was a chance to run the restaurant of their dreams in New London, as well.
Mackbee and Lucas drove out to New London to meet with Josh Reed and Christa Otteson. The couples hit it off immediately, and after subsequent visits it was determined that Mackbee and Lucas would be the perfect fit to run the restaurant space they wanted to build. Work on an 1800-square foot expansion of Goat Ridge began in late 2017 with Reed and Otteson financing the build-out of the restaurant space and kitchen. In the meantime, Mackbee and Lucas began to network with a number of local farmers who could supply them with the organic produce, meats and dairy products. Mackbee would be the main chef while Lucas would be the kitchen supervisor/coordinator and also bake bread and pies. Once everything was in place, Mackbee and Lucas opened Model Citizen in June of 2018.
Model Citizen is counter service only with no wait staff. Patrons are asked to bus their dishes after they've finished. The restaurant furniture is similar to what we saw in the small area off to the side of the tap room at Goat Ridge including a church pew that is used for banquette seating along one wall. The chairs and tables can be easily moved to make the expanded room a dance floor if needed.
The food counter is opposite the bar area in the expanded tap room at Goat Ridge. They have a chalkboard above and to the right of the window that shows daily specials, as well as a list of farms they're working with - all within a 100-mile radius of New London - and what food or produce that farm provided. Sometimes local people with backyard gardens will come in with vegetables that they just give to Model Citizen because they would go to waste because they had too many tomatoes, peppers or beans.
They have printed menus at the counter, but many of the items are subject to availability since they source all the food at Model Citizen locally. For example, my wife saw that they had an asparagus salad on the menu, but it was crossed off that day as they were out of asparagus. (As we were having our lunch, a lady came in with tubs of asparagus to drop off. "I guess the asparagus salad is back on the menu," my wife quipped.) It's not an extensive menu at Model Citizen, but they had entrees such as a baked mac & cheese with blue cheese, muenster, and cheddar cheese, as well as a ratatouille pasta dish. Sandwiches such as chicken parm, a roast beef sandwich, and a BLT (that I almost got considering they sourced everything locally) were available as was a grass-fed burger. Shared plates such as a meat and cheese board, tempura battered veggies, and a sautƩed kale with a garlic pesto on toasted rye bread were also available. After 4:30 p.m., Modern Citizen fires up their wood-fired grill for beef, pork or chicken specials of the evening.
We stepped up to the counter to order our food and Mateo Mackbee took our order directly. My wife went with the steak salad - a heaping helping of arugula mixed with roasted red potatoes and onions all mixed in with chunks of steak, topped with fresh shaved parmesan cheese and a house dressing. It was a huge salad and my wife couldn't help but remark how fresh the arugula tasted. "This is definitely farm fresh," she said between bites. "I've never gotten arugula like this in a store."
Since everything at Modern Citizen is made from scratch, it takes awhile for some orders to make it to the table. That was no problem as I we were enjoying the Smash Mosaic from the bar at Goat Ridge while we waited for our food to show up. It turned out the hold-up was my fault - I ordered the jambalaya. Mateo Mackbee's family on his mother's side hails from New Orleans and this was obviously one of the recipes he has taken from the family. This was true jambalaya with big chunks of andouille sausage, shrimp, chicken, the "holy trinity" of onions, bell peppers and celery, with a rich and fresh tomato broth on a bed of jasmine rice. A lot of times if I'm having jambalaya in a restaurant, I'll get some Tabasco to help give it a kick. This jambalaya didn't need any help as it had a kick of its own. It was simply outstanding, some of the best and most authentic jambalaya I've ever had.
My wife and I loved everything about both Goat Ridge Brewing Company and Model Citizen - The Restaurant. The beer was very good, the food we had was excellent, the vibe of the place was laid-back and the staff and patrons were extremely friendly, and we felt that it was one of the better brew pub experiences we've ever had. Having something like Goat Ridge and Model Citizen in a small town like New London was very unique. We were there no less than three times because we liked the place so very much. It's an hour drive down from St. Cloud and I may have to go back to New London at some point when I get back up that way when the weather gets better in the Spring of 2020.
Update Spring 2021 - Mateo Mackbee and Erin Lucas gave up their lease to the kitchen and moved on to open a new New Orleans-inspired restaurant in St. Joseph, MN by the name of Krewe. Look for an upcoming Road Tips entry on Krewe. The owners of Goat Ridge now run the kitchen and primarily make pizzas in the kitchen.