#69: Jennifer and Rodney Barrett - Farmers of a Different Feather
Meet Rodney and Jennifer Barrett of Barrett Family Farm.
Jennifer and Rodney have been poultry and cattle farmers in rural Arkansas for almost 20 years. But, after a series of major health setbacks, financial hardships, and moral crises, they finally decided to give it up. No longer could they reconcile their work with a greater purpose and, as Rodney says, “You wouldn’t think we’d be doing something for so long that was detrimental to our own health.”
But, like most of us, they just didn’t know...until they sought the real truth.
Today - those chicken houses that would breed over 100,000 chickens every 52 days? They’re now giving birth to thousands of nourishing mushrooms. And the cattle? They’re like children.
This is their courageous, ethical, and compassionate journey from poultry to plants.
Episode and PLANTSTRONG Resources:
Join our Mystery Valentines Day Dinner with Chef's Garden - All the Ingredients Delivered Directly to Your Door
PLANTSTRONG Foods - Pizza Crust is Back in Stock
PLANTSTRONG Meal Planner - Discover the easy way to eat PLANTSTRONG
Rodney Barrett:
At first, it's hard to understand it, because you just wouldn't think that we'd be doing something for so long that would be detrimental to our health.
Rip Esselstyn:
Yep.
Rodney Barrett:
When you come to find out that the truth is there, and you just really willingly staying ignorant to the fact, and not researching it, and not digging into it to find out what that's about, and what's all happening, it's really shameful that I waited so long. I have a lot of anxiety for what I did for so long, that I feel like I'm running behind now. We want to go hard and fast, and go the other direction.
Rip Esselstyn:
Season three of the Plant Strong podcast explores those Galileo moments where you seek to understand the real truth around your health, and dare to see the world through a different lens. This season, we honor those courageous seekers who are paving the way for you and me. So grab your telescope, point it towards your future, and let's get plant-strong together.
Rip Esselstyn:
Hello and welcome to the Plant Strong podcast. Valentine's Day is right around the corner, and with the pandemic this year, it will be pretty darn difficult, if not impossible, to make dinner reservations, let along find a restaurant that serves you a plant strong, heart healthy meal. That is exactly why we've partnered with our new friends at the Chef's Garden to bring you an extra special, four course adventure right to your doorstep.
Rip Esselstyn:
We have just a few boxes remaining, and every ingredient has been hand picked from this regenerative farm, and is loaded with both nutrition and flavor. A random selection of boxes will get a super fun surprise, a heart shaped cucumber. How adorable is that? Sign up today, and we'll send you a box brimming with ingredients to make dinner for two, along with printed menu and recipe cards, and a library of videos, so you can know exactly how to make every one of these incredible dishes.
Rip Esselstyn:
As a special perk for our podcast listeners, today I'm going to reveal the dessert course. So spoiler alert, if you want to be surprised, skip ahead right now while I wait. Okay. Here it is. Our fourth course is a sweet potato mazamorra. Let's repeat that together, mazamorra. It just rolls off the tongue. Now, before my trip to the farm, I had never heard of a mazamorra, and I had never eaten a sweet potato for dessert. But this was insane. It's a baked, creamy custard that literally fools you into thinking it's cream based. I cannot wait to make it for my wife for Valentine's Day. Boxes will ship next week, so don't delay in order. Visit plantstrong.com/gardentoday and reserve your spot.
Rip Esselstyn:
Today I want to introduce you to Jennifer and Rodney Barrett of Barrett Family Farms. They may not be a household name to you yet, but I assure you, their personal story will have a lasting impact. For almost 20 years, Jennifer and Rodney were poultry and cattle farmers in Arkansas. It's in their family's blood. However, after a series of major health setbacks, financial hardships, and moral crises, they finally decided to give it up. No longer could they reconcile their work with a greater purpose, and as Rodney says, "You wouldn't think we'd be doing something for so long that was so detrimental to our own health." But like most of us, they just didn't know any better. Until they saw the truth.
Rip Esselstyn:
Today, those chicken houses that would breed over 100,000 chickens every 52 days, they're now giving birth to thousands of functional, nourishing mushrooms, and the cattle are literally part of the family. This is their courageous and compassionate journey to health, and a radical, ethical transformation.
Rip Esselstyn:
Rodney and Jennifer Barrett, I want to welcome you to season three of the Plant Strong podcast. Thank you so much for joining me and our listeners for this conversation. I've known you all for, I'm going to guess now it's been about three years, if I'm not mistaken? Two and a half, three years?
Jennifer Barrett:
It was three years, 2018.
Rip Esselstyn:
Okay. So we're going to get to that. But I don't want to get to that yet. But where I want to start is, so season three of the podcast, what we're really doing is we're highlighting those courageous seekers of the truth that then have done something about it. You guys, to me, absolutely epitomize that. So what I'd like to do is I want you to share your story. But let's start at the very, very beginning. If you could tell me about your life in Arkansas before you found Plant Strong living.
Jennifer Barrett:
Okay. You go.
Rodney Barrett:
No, you can start it off.
Jennifer Barrett:
Okay. Well, we moved here in late 1999, we moved to the farm. Took over my parent's chicken operation. Rodney and I both have a love of farm life, country life. We both grew up around ... Both of our grandparents had farms, and we just loved that farm life. We lived in Huntsville, Texas before then. Rodney worked for the prison, I had a job at the school. When the opportunity came up for us to move here to the farm, we just jumped on it, and took it. Raised chickens in my parent's old chicken houses for ... Six years?
Rodney Barrett:
Six and a half, almost seven.
Jennifer Barrett:
Six and a half years, until we couldn't compete anymore in the industry with those old houses. So we had to either upgrade or build new facilities. So we chose to go all in and build new facilities in 2006, and raise chickens. We had four 500 foot chicken houses that we raised around 100,000 chickens every 52-ish days.
Rodney Barrett:
Yeah, turnaround was about two months. I mean, [crosstalk 00:07:22] time and everything, you had about a two month turnaround. You raise the birds, or the broilers, somewhere between 45 days and as much as, we went one time about 63 days. That was rough, right there.
Jennifer Barrett:
They were big chickens.
Rodney Barrett:
But that was a start on a whole new-
Rip Esselstyn:
Then what happens at the end of those 52, or 53, or 63 days? Are you then selling them to somebody?
Rodney Barrett:
The company decides exactly where they want that average bird weight to be based on the market that they're selling into.
Jennifer Barrett:
But the bird we picked up, and the company-
Rodney Barrett:
The company has got a catch crew, that they'll come out with trucks, and cages, and everything, and they'll ham load them things in the cages and haul them to the processing plant, where they'll be slaughtered. They'll be packaged and sent out to wherever.
Rip Esselstyn:
Got it.
Jennifer Barrett:
We also had, we have cows too, because when you have chicken houses, you just have cows. We had land, and so we ran a cow/calf operation as well, that helped to supplement our income. It kind of seemingly worked symbiotically. The chicken litter helped to fertilize the ground which helped to grow the hay and the grass which fed the cows. So there was this seemingly symbiosis to it. But yeah.
Rip Esselstyn:
I think we've all seen, what is it? The biggest little farm, something like that? Makes it look very idealistic, obviously. Which I don't know, maybe that's what you guys were going for.
Jennifer Barrett:
Kind of.
Rodney Barrett:
In a way, yes. The idea is for everything to work together, all work for each other, animals included. A full loop circle of ecosystem.
Jennifer Barrett:
Yeah. So we did, we were full in chicken farmers, cow/calf, we did that for almost 20 years. Yeah.
Rip Esselstyn:
Almost 20 years. Then what happened?
Jennifer Barrett:
Well, in 2011, Rodney got sick. He was having some very bad symptoms. We finally got him diagnosed with ulcerative colitis. That just sent us on a journey. It really did, because the doctor that diagnosed him basically handed me a piece of paper, gave us no hope, said, "Here is your prescription for the medicine you need." The prognosis wasn't good. They gave us no indication of how to adjust diet. It was just, "Here is your prescription, make a followup appointment." So before I even got out to the car with that, with our walking orders, I was already trying to figure out. There has got to be another way. There just has to be ... This can't be it, because first of all, the prescription was really expensive.
Rodney Barrett:
Yes, it was.
Jennifer Barrett:
And we didn't have insurance. We were like, "There has got to be something else."
Rodney Barrett:
Yeah, that didn't last very long. I probably took that medication they gave me for maybe three months, or maybe a little bit longer than three months, because it made me feel awful. It felt like you swallowed about a three or four inch rock, and it just sat in your gut all day long. By the morning, you'd be gone, but you got to do it over again. I finally told her, I'd rather just go ahead and die like they said I would in two years if I didn't take this medicine. I just couldn't keep taking it.
Rip Esselstyn:
So will you let our listeners know, what exactly, what's your understanding of what is ulcerative colitis?
Rodney Barrett:
Well, it's an inflammation of the colon. It's an autoimmune problem that happens over time, it suppresses your immunity system to be able to fight off that inflammation that develops from toxicity in your foods and stuff in your colon. Mind got bad enough to where it was inflamed and bleeding pretty severely. This went on for probably four and a half years or five years I was trying to figure out how to solve that problem.
Rodney Barrett:
We finally got hooked up with a chiropractor out of Texarkana that worked with us a little bit. He did some workshops on chronic diseases like diabetes, heart disease, cancer, just all different sorts of information that he did once a month, and we were going to this chiropractor usually once a week for quite some time. This information just kept perpetuating us searching for answers. It kept Jennifer hooked up pretty tight, because it was going against a lot of the things that we grew up believing in, and how we lived, and how we function from day-to-day. Whenever them light bulbs started coming on, and we figured out that a lot of this stuff we're doing to ourselves by what we're eating. We gradually figured this out. She was a Beach Body coach for a little while.
Jennifer Barrett:
Well, in 2013, like I had been searching, we tried essential oils, I tried to give him bland food, the things I was reading, like no beans, no peppers, things that would irritate his gut. So we were doing bland stuff. But it really didn't seem to make that much of a difference. But when we started out cutting processed stuff, like we started doing more vegetables, we were still eating meat, and dairy, and eggs, lots of eggs.
Rodney Barrett:
Butter.
Jennifer Barrett:
Butter, we were still doing all of that. But we cut out a lot of the processed stuff. We were going to the chiropractor. In 2013, I had my own revelation with my health, because I saw a picture of myself, and I was overweight, it just shocked me that I was that overweight. I had been suffering with depression, with arthritis, high blood pressure, chronic western diseases. Obesity. So 2013, I started my own little journey, turned out to be a big journey, to try to get fitter, healthier, lose weight, and all that.
Jennifer Barrett:
It started out with, it was vain, because I did not like the way I looked at all. So I started trying to get healthier. Whenever I started working out every day, and we started cutting out processed food, going to the chiropractor, and it was like obvious that the choices we were making, the food choices we were making were making a big difference in the way we felt and the way we were functioning as humans. Then in 2016, I'd been a Beach Body coach for a while. My coach said-
Rip Esselstyn:
Let me just stop you for a sec. When you say Beach Body, is this an exercise platform? Is this a nutrition platform? What is it?
Jennifer Barrett:
It is. Beach Body has a library of workouts, Tony Horton ... I started out with P90X3, I don't know if you ...
Rip Esselstyn:
Yeah.
Jennifer Barrett:
Yeah. So I bought a DVD set of P90X3, and I started with that, and then just kind of got deeper into coaching, and the multi-level marketing part of it, and all of that. Tried to do all that. My coach said, "If you want to be a good Beach Body coach, everybody should do this three week reset," Which is a 21 day program where the first week, you have some animal protein, but the last 14 days are completely plant based.
Rip Esselstyn:
So this was 2016?
Jennifer Barrett:
2016.
Rip Esselstyn:
So this was your first exposure, then, to slowly starting to reduce meat?
Jennifer Barrett:
Yes.
Rodney Barrett:
That is correct.
Jennifer Barrett:
It was the first time that we had ever done that. We also gave up coffee. It was like an alkalizing cleanse, kind of reset situation. So those three weeks, we dove into, we had a book, that had all of the shopping lists, and the recipes. We learned like tempe, and tofu, we didn't know what any of these things were. But it sent us on this journey, we were meal prepping our asses off.
Rodney Barrett:
It was great.
Jennifer Barrett:
It was.
Rip Esselstyn:
I love that you loved it, that's good.
Jennifer Barrett:
Yeah, but by the end of the three weeks, I felt so amazing. We both felt so great, because we did two weeks of just micro green salads, and all the veggies. We were eating so much veggies, and big fruit plates in the morning.
Rodney Barrett:
Yeah, it was awesome.
Jennifer Barrett:
It was amazing. So the day after we finished that, we had a cup of coffee. So we were in the stratosphere, because we had been eating this clean amazing diet, and we hadn't been having coffee, and then we had one of our beautiful cups of coffee.
Rip Esselstyn:
Now you're zinging.
Jennifer Barrett:
Yes.
Rodney Barrett:
Oh, wow. Yeah.
Jennifer Barrett:
I really, really started having to ask myself some really tough questions.
Rip Esselstyn:
Like what?
Jennifer Barrett:
Well, I felt amazing, and then I was going to work in a chicken house. I was doing that work, and I was still sending calves to slaughter. So all of those-
Rodney Barrett:
The questions started coming up about not only what we were doing for trying to make a living here, but what we were doing to ourselves by participating in eating those types of foods, those animal protein foods that was causing us all to be sick. I mean, we prove dit to ourselves in a three week, 21 day reset program that came from Beach Body. We proved that to ourselves, and it took us a little bit to let those switches start coming on to realize what was happening. But we were connected to it. We were actually connected to all of this, and ready to receive all of that stuff.
Rip Esselstyn:
Well, yeah, you're right. You guys were connected to it in a much more fundamental level than most people, because you had a chicken farm, you said producing, what was it, 100,000 every 50 something days?
Rodney Barrett:
Yeah, they're placed, 102,000 chickens approximately every 60 days. Somewhere in that neighborhood.
Rip Esselstyn:
Then you had the cows as well. So then, what's your next move?
Jennifer Barrett:
Well, for a long time, not a long time, we thought, or I thought I could reconcile it. I thought we had this huge fiscal responsibility. We weren't going to shirk that.
Rodney Barrett:
Rip, it was awful.
Jennifer Barrett:
It was awful.
Rodney Barrett:
It was awful whenever the switches came on, and we started ... We were, basically, hypocrites.
Jennifer Barrett:
Well, we had proven this thing to ourselves. I had listened to people talking about a vegan diet, I had listened to people. I bought the books. One of the first books I bought that was from my friend Kathy Freston, she's my friend now. She was not then. Because I saw her on Oprah, and I was like, "Oh my god, she just had this light in her eyes, and she looked so healthy, and vibrant." I bought the book, I flipped through it. To me, it was just this fringe, it was another diet, right? I just couldn't accept it then.
Rip Esselstyn:
That was in 2016 still?
Jennifer Barrett:
No. I bought Kathy's book back in 2009 or something, a long time ago. But see, I just wasn't ready then. I was like, "This is crazy, I don't understand this. That's fringe-y, and froo-froo-y to eat vegetables."
Rodney Barrett:
We were too embedded in animal agriculture at that time. We were so neck deep in the business, in the debt of it, in the everyday aspect of what was going on that-
Rip Esselstyn:
So how do you reconcile all this? How do you reconcile it financially, and how do you reconcile it mentally, emotionally, physically? What did you guys do?
Jennifer Barrett:
I know, it's been crazy. Well, the financial part was the hard part, right? Because that's what kept us doing our job. Our farm, our lives, everything had been mortgaged, and we ... There was just not a way out of it. Unfortunately, the poultry industry does not ... It's not rigged in the farmer's favor for them to be successful. It's just not. I don't want to go too far down that rabbit hole, but the poultry industry, it's not rigged for the farmers to be successful.
Jennifer Barrett:
So when I started understanding that, that even if we put in the time to pay the farm off, and get through, and get to the point where we don't have to do this job, I was just doing the math. I'm not good at math. It just was not going to work. There was no way to get out of it. So December 2017, I sent a letter out into the universe. I just was at the bottom, I could not continue to know what I know and do that job. I just couldn't.
Jennifer Barrett:
There was too much information, I had too much truth. I had proved it to myself by eating a plant-based diet, and feeling the way I felt. I just proved it to myself. So really at the bottom, at the bottom of that, I sat down and just pounded out a letter. I sent it out to Kathy Freston, I sent one to Rich Roll, I sent it to somebody else. Kathy got back with me.
Rip Esselstyn:
Bless her.
Jennifer Barrett:
Yeah. Since then, it's just been kind of a roller coaster. It was September 2018 was our lats batch of chickens. June of 2018, we pulled our bulls off of the cows and stopped breeding. It's been one miracle after another that has sustained us this long. We're still here, and we are still in very much transition to transform the poultry barns into mushroom houses. We're just still, we're about 80% there now, which is very, very exciting.
Rip Esselstyn:
Have you started actually growing any kind of mushrooms yet?
Jennifer Barrett:
Not yet.
Rodney Barrett:
Not yet. But that's in the near future. We're looking at doing a small scale here pretty soon, and start somewhere. Because we've still got a little bit to go on the big facility. We're really antsy, we're ready.
Jennifer Barrett:
It has been, you cannot even believe what's happened in the last two years. It has just been a-
Rip Esselstyn:
What kind of mushrooms are you going to grow? A variety, or is there one in particular?
Jennifer Barrett:
We hope to start with King Oysters, but we actually want to, with COVID, it has changed everything. We're hoping to let our eventual end users dictate what they want, and what the market ... Hopefully be able to have a big enough facility that we can do that, we'll be able to fulfill what the m;arket needs.
Rip Esselstyn:
The great thing about mushrooms is instead of turning over every 53 days like your chickens, these guys will turnover, what, is it like a matter of days in some cases?
Rodney Barrett:
24 to, at the most, about 35 days.
Jennifer Barrett:
Depending on-
Rodney Barrett:
Four to 27, [crosstalk 00:25:14].
Jennifer Barrett:
Yeah. They don't poop.
Rip Esselstyn:
No, they don't, do they? They are fun guys, aren't they?
Jennifer Barrett:
They are.
Rip Esselstyn:
That is super exciting. Did the poultry industry have anything to say about you guys deciding to pull up roots, so to speak?
Rodney Barrett:
You know, we tried to step out gracefully. I don't wish any ill will on the ...
Jennifer Barrett:
They did offer to help us sell our farm.
Rodney Barrett:
Yeah. I don't want any ill will, how we thought before that we're supposed to exist on the planet. Part of it. I can't take that away from myself. I can't. We all come from backgrounds of our past, and how we've lived, and what we've done. I just hope now that we're on this new path, that ... We're just a better, shining light for all humanity, and to help put a different spin on what's necessary in life to live. Animal protein is not necessary.
Rodney Barrett:
Coming to grips with that, and finding that out from where I came from, and how I grew up, at first it's hard to understand it, because you just wouldn't think that we'd be doing something for so long that would be detrimental to our health. When you come to find out that the truth is there, and you're just really willingly staying ignorant to the fact, and not researching it, and not digging into it to find out what that's about, and what's all happening, it's really shameful that I waited so long. I mean, I have a lot of anxiety for what I did for so long, that I feel like I'm running behind now. We want to go hard and fast, and go the other direction.
Rip Esselstyn:
We met about two years ago, I think you said, Jennifer. Can you go through that, where we met, and how was that experience for you guys?
Jennifer Barrett:
Well, part of, one of the miracles that happened, we were part of an ongoing documentary about the farm transformation. Shawn Munson invited us to come to the Engine 2 Immersion. Honestly, I did not even know where Sedona was. I had never heard of it. I didn't know what an emersion, I did not know what was happening. But we had this chance to come and it was right after we sold our last batch of chickens. So it was the first time we had been-
Rodney Barrett:
The first time we really did anything to be ... In 20 years.
Jennifer Barrett:
Yeah. So it was a big deal getting on the plane, and all of that. When I was telling people that we were going to Sedona, people were like, "Oh, I've always wanted to go to Sedona." I was like, "I had no idea." Honestly, I'm such a farm girl, we had no idea.
Rodney Barrett:
Awesome experience.
Jennifer Barrett:
It was.
Rodney Barrett:
It really was an experience.
Jennifer Barrett:
So we came to the immersion, and-
Rodney Barrett:
Your dad.
Jennifer Barrett:
Stayed there for a week. I honestly think that every human being that has a human body should-
Rodney Barrett:
Every one of us.
Jennifer Barrett:
Should be privileged to have the understanding, and the understanding, and information that was shared at that immersion.
Rodney Barrett:
It was so awesome.
Jennifer Barrett:
Rodney and I, we officially became vegan in July of 2018. But we had started playing around with some of the Gardein, and that kind of stuff. We were cooking with a lot of oil, eating coconut oil. So when we got the immersion, and y'all were all no oil, we were like, "I just don't know about this." We were both-
Rip Esselstyn:
This is a little too far.
Jennifer Barrett:
I don't understand what they're doing. But we spent a week there, and ate all the food, and learned all the things. We had so much fun, and learned so much. I still have this vision of your mom coming out of that dining hall with her plate just mounted up, and she had the biggest smile on her face in the whole wide world, and [inaudible 00:30:18]. So yeah. But when we got home from the immersion, from eating that way for a week, no oil, whole foods base, we got home on a Saturday? I can't remember. But the next day, I did one of my workouts that I've been doing since 2013, there was no comparison.
Rodney Barrett:
There is no comparison.
Rip Esselstyn:
So you crushed it?
Jennifer Barrett:
Absolutely. I started crying when it was over, because it was not even the same experience.
Rodney Barrett:
It is so insane the difference.
Jennifer Barrett:
Yeah.
Rodney Barrett:
It's so insane.
Jennifer Barrett:
Yes. I just want to show up, and push myself to the edge. Not push myself, but-
Rodney Barrett:
It's not about the push. It's just what you can.
Jennifer Barrett:
Yeah. After being so thick for so long, and dealing with overweight, and all of that bullshit-
Rodney Barrett:
The amount of endurance just from the start, after being on that no oil-
Jennifer Barrett:
Whole food, plant-based-
Rodney Barrett:
Whole food, plant-based meal prep, there is no comparison.
Jennifer Barrett:
No.
Rodney Barrett:
None at all. There is nothing.
Rip Esselstyn:
So tell me, so that wasn't quite two years ago. What did your family and friends think of what you guys were doing? Did they think you guys had seriously flown the coop?
Jennifer Barrett:
Yes. Absolutely.
Rodney Barrett:
In a lot of ways.
Jennifer Barrett:
A lot of our relationships have changed since this has happened, because people just couldn't accept it.
Rip Esselstyn:
Changed how? Meaning like some relationships are no longer?
Jennifer Barrett:
Yes, actually, yeah.
Rodney Barrett:
Even that, yes.
Jennifer Barrett:
It happened. But like I said, Rodney and I, we just know too much truth. There is no denying it.
Rodney Barrett:
We spent, Rip, before we were actually changing our ways and stuff, we were sitting down there at those poultry barns for sometimes an hour at a time, trying to figure out something else to do with those buildings, and still had to go in there and pick up dead corpses of chickens, and finish our job. We went through this for a couple of years.
Jennifer Barrett:
Trying to figure out a different way.
Rip Esselstyn:
So how had your relationship changed or manifested over the last several years?
Jennifer Barrett:
Me and Rodney?
Rip Esselstyn:
Yeah, you and Rodney.
Jennifer Barrett:
Oh, it's good. Well, we've had this really intense journey that we've had to travel together. So I think that just, by default, brings ... Well, it could do one of two things. It can just make everything crumble, or it can make you become closer. We definitely have. Whole food, plant-based diet is good for lots of things.
Rodney Barrett:
Lots and lots of things. Beneficial things.
Jennifer Barrett:
We're really, really happy. Really happy.
Rip Esselstyn:
Rodney, what has happened with your ulcerative colitis?
Rodney Barrett:
I haven't had any symptoms at all since I've gotten to the complete whole food, plant-based, no animal protein whatsoever, and gotten off of fried foods, and not cooking in oil, and grease, and stuff anymore. I haven't had any symptoms. Now, every once in a while the stress still gets up pretty tight, and I will have some inflammation and stuff that develops. But I get it in my joints sometimes, my shoulders, and knees, and stuff. But it's just stress related.
Jennifer Barrett:
Stress.
Rodney Barrett:
But as far as problems coming from my diet, I don't have that as long as I stay off of that processed food. I mean, I can go eat an Oreo right now, and in 20 minutes, I guarantee, I can feel it in my knuckles, I can feel it in my ... I can feel it in my joints very quickly. You mess up, you will know it.
Rip Esselstyn:
Yep. Jennifer, it sounds like you're as lean and mean as you've ever been, and fit, and super well.
Jennifer Barrett:
I'm doing really good. I am. I enjoy my workouts. I started off 2020 with a traumatic knee injury, actually. Some of my old arthritis creeped up, and tried to run too quick, and it just buckled out from underneath me. I had a lot of swelling, and pain. But started out with some physical therapy, and a low impact workout that I've been doing, actually, all year. It's a Barre workout, B-A-R-R-E, you know, Barre? Oh my gosh, it's been amazing. But definitely night and day difference showing up to workout on a whole food [inaudible 00:35:36] no oil.
Rip Esselstyn:
Tell me, can you tell me what does a typical day of eating look like for the Barretts?
Jennifer Barrett:
We have gotten so lazy.
Rip Esselstyn:
But what does lazy whole food, plant-based look like?
Jennifer Barrett:
Beans, rice, oatmeal, potatoes, lots of leafy greens. We usually just get a bowl, fill it with leafy greens, whatever we have cooked up in the instant pot, like wet potatoes, rice, quinoa, things like that, that we put on our greens. I love to make ranch dressing with the cashews. Any kind of sauce, balsamic vinegar on top, limes, whatever squeezed on top.
Rodney Barrett:
Nut-
Jennifer Barrett:
A lot of nutritional yeast.
Rip Esselstyn:
So all that you just said there, that doesn't sound lazy to me. That sounds delicious.
Rodney Barrett:
It is.
Jennifer Barrett:
Very delicious. But as far as doing a lot of froo-froo-y cooking or meal prepping, we just ...
Rodney Barrett:
We don't go through a bunch of fancy ... We keep it simple.
Jennifer Barrett:
It's very simple.
Rip Esselstyn:
That's the great thing about this lifestyle, to me, is it's very customizable. Right? If you want to do it simple and delicious, like what you just said, you can do that. If on the weekends you want to get a little more froo-froo and create a casserole, or some sort of a wonderful soup or stew, you can do that as well, or [inaudible 00:37:01], or pancakes, and then why not? Yeah, oatmeal, rice and beans, sweet potatoes with whatever. I mean, yeah, it doesn't matter how you slice it, you're in heaven.
Jennifer Barrett:
Absolutely.
Rodney Barrett:
Hey, our cookbooks have changed.
Rip Esselstyn:
They have.
Rodney Barrett:
They have. They've completely changed. We use y'all's Engine 2 cookbook all the time.
Rip Esselstyn:
Yeah.
Jennifer Barrett:
[crosstalk 00:37:25]. It's one of my favorites.
Rip Esselstyn:
What does the next six months to a year look like for you guys? Do you guys have any kind of vision into that? What can we do, everybody that's listening, what can we do to help send you guys good vibes?
Jennifer Barrett:
Well, we are working on the sanctuary plan for the cows. We still have 241 cows. We only have 160 grazeable acres around that. So it's too many cows, too small a piece of land. We have, somehow, miraculously, been able to maintain. They're all doing really well. The ground is suffering. So our plan is to implement rotational grazing to help-
Rodney Barrett:
To intensify the grazing.
Jennifer Barrett:
Right. To help build the soil.
Rodney Barrett:
We've got to move faster.
Jennifer Barrett:
But we're going to have to acquire some more land. So that's definitely very soon going to happen, so that we can spread the herd out. We did just launch our social media pages, which kind of got put on hold, well, did get put on hold after we lost Rodney's dad. So that's exciting, because we're gong to start to be able to share everything that's happening here. I love sharing on social media. I just absolutely love to share the journey that we've been having. But the last couple of years have kept us, there has been a lot of operational changes, and organizational changes. We are now in a place where I can just start to share. So if people want to follow along, Barrett Family Farm.
Rip Esselstyn:
What's the handle?
Jennifer Barrett:
It's Barrett Family Farm on Instagram and Facebook.
Rip Esselstyn:
Got it. Rodney, you mentioned that your father passed away. Did he pass away due to complications from COVID? Or what was it?
Rodney Barrett:
Yeah, it was complications due to COVID. He got pneumonia, and from that point, he just went downhill. It just overwhelmed him, and started shutting his organs and stuff down. He just wasn't getting oxygen to his body the way he needed it. I'm not really up to date on what standard protocol is on this COVID, but you don't want it. You don't want to go in the hospital, because the outcomes are not very good. The doctors and stuff, during that process, my little brother was dealing with most of that, because he was down there in the area with him. He lived with him. So he was the one going back and forth to the doctors and whatnot.
Rodney Barrett:
But still, even he was not allowed in that hospital to be next to him, during any of that. The closest he could get to him, until his last breathe, was behind a glass. Just, Rip, this is awful. People are having to deal with this thing, and losing loved ones everywhere, including myself. They're having to ... They can't even hug them goodbye before it's too late. It's just over. When they ventilated him, he was already gone. He agreed to it, and that was the last time. That was it. It was over. It's just not cool. This is another thing where I firmly believe that a plant strong, plant-based, whole food, plant-based diet, I firmly believe that it helps us to not contract this virus. I really believe that.
Rip Esselstyn:
To defend it, to defend it. So it's more of a glancing blow.
Rodney Barrett:
Right.
Rip Esselstyn:
Yep.
Jennifer Barrett:
Honestly, it wouldn't even exist if we were only-
Rip Esselstyn:
You're right. Right. It seems like it was a zoonotic, so it basically came from animals. The wet markets in China. You're right. At some point, I wish that the media would acknowledge that we can prevent the vast majority of these pandemics if we would stop eating animals.
Rodney Barrett:
That is correct. I believe that 100%, 125%. I know it's true. I've witnessed what it's done for me and Jennifer. There is just too many benefits for it to not help that too. Even if you don't have the proof in front of our face, you know what I'm saying?
Rip Esselstyn:
Yep, totally. Well, you guys, I want to wish you all the best. I love the fact that everything has come into alignment for you guys. So with your mission, and your values, and what you hold near and dear now. I'm sure it wasn't easy for you guys to make this 180 pivot from basically raising chickens to raising mushrooms. But man, are we ever rooting for you guys. I have a feeling that because you got all your passion behind this, and you truly believe in it in your heart and soul, that good things are going to happen. So I'm so glad that we had the privilege and opportunity to meet in Sedona a couple of years ago. Whatever part we played in getting you guys on your journey, but it is so good to see you guys, Rodney and Jennifer. You guys look fantastic.
Jennifer Barrett:
Thank you.
Rodney Barrett:
You look good yourself, Rip.
Jennifer Barrett:
You do.
Rodney Barrett:
I can't wait to see all you guys again. We had such a good time up there.
Jennifer Barrett:
It was so fun.
Rodney Barrett:
Yeah. I look forward to doing something like that again, I really do.
Jennifer Barrett:
That immersion was the cherry on top.
Rodney Barrett:
Yeah, it was.
Jennifer Barrett:
It was like the final, I don't know what you even call it. We are born again. If we eat anything with oil in it, we're just like, "Oho my gosh." Every once in a while it happens, but we're like, "It's a [inaudible 00:44:11]." Chocolate, or a chip every once in a while. But because we just know how it feels to continue to follow that lifestyle.
Rodney Barrett:
That's right.
Jennifer Barrett:
It's too good.
Rodney Barrett:
It's too good.
Rip Esselstyn:
Too good. It's too good, and it's true. It's not too good to be true, it's too good and it's true.
Jennifer Barrett:
And it's true, absolutely.
Rip Esselstyn:
Well, you guys, will you help do the sendoff with me? So just repeat after me. Peace-
Jennifer Barrett:
Peace-
Rodney Barrett:
Peace-
Rip Esselstyn:
Engine 2-
Rodney Barrett:
Engine 2-
Jennifer Barrett:
Engin 2-
Rip Esselstyn:
Keep it Plant Strong.
Jennifer Barrett:
Keep it Plant Strong.
Rodney Barrett:
Keep it Plant Strong.
Rip Esselstyn:
Here's to you, Barretts. Thank you.
Rodney Barrett:
Rip, thanks so much.
Rip Esselstyn:
Thank you Rodney and Jennifer. Against so many odds you continue to seek the real truth about not just your health, but the health of the animals, and the planet. You are a part of the solution, a light for others who are looking for the path. We're eternally grateful for your bravery, and your belief in a better future for everyone. Thank you for listening to the Plant Strong podcast. You can support the show by taking a quick minute to subscribe, rate, and review at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. Sharing the show with your network is another great way to help us reach as many people as possible, with the great news about plants. Thank you in advance for your support, it means everything to me.
Rip Esselstyn:
Have you had your own Galileo moment that you'd like to share? What happened when you stepped into the arena and shed the beliefs that you thought to be true? I'd love to hear about it. Visit Plantstrongpodcast.com to submit your story, and to learn more about today's guests and sponsors. The PLANTSTRONG podcast team includes Carrie Barrett, Laurie Kortowich, Ami Mackey, Patrick Gavin, and Wade Clark. This season is dedicated to all of those courageous truth seekers who weren't afraid to look through the lens with clear vision and hold firm to a higher truth. Most notably, my parents, Dr. Caldwell B. Esselstyn Jr. And Ann Crile Esstelstyn. Thanks for listening.
Podcast Sponsors
