Providing fresh flavor for life’s big moments

Lori Kaye Lodes

Contributor

August 18, 2025

RIVER FALLS – As the owner and operator of Mindful Fork Catering, Chef Angie Larson said her mission is to connect people through unforgettable food – uncomplicated but delicious, fresh, farm-to-fork catered food for all life’s celebrations.

It’s a passion Larson said she’s been fulfilling for the past several years since transitioning what started as Mindful Fork Meal Prep into Mindful Fork Catering.

Good food is all in the family

Larson said her passion for the culinary arts dates back decades, working the front of house for a restaurant as a young teen and then working in her family’s Italian restaurant in the early 2000s.

She said she shifted gears after that, becoming a personal chef for several years and then an executive chef for five more years before starting her own business. 

“I realized I love doing real food, and I love parties and celebrations,” she said, “so I decided to branch out and be my own business.”

Things started, Larson said, by contracting with nutritionists at local hospitals and going into people’s homes to teach them how to meal prep.

She said that included everything from how to prepare vegetables healthfully to making their favorite recipes differently.

Larson said her goal was to educate people on how to eat farm to fork with real ingredients sourced locally or from shopping the perimeter of the grocery store (instead of processed foods), and what to do with those ingredients.

However, she said she quickly tired of driving all over to teach meal preparation to patients who were often uninterested in learning and changing their ways. 

“Their health professionals were telling them they needed it, and it was a lot of running,” she said. “So, I asked myself, ‘How can I do that but tailor it to people who are interested?’ And that’s where the actual meal prep came into it.”

The COVID-19 pandemic, Larson said, “was about the art of the pivot – and I did.”

“I was nervous about it, and there was a slowdown of about four to six months, but then it was nuts when people became sick and tired of eating frozen pizzas or cooking all the time,” she said.

Fast-forward a year and a half, and Larson said she was managing a menu with 40 items changing weekly and a lot of “one-off” preparations.

She said she took a pause and asked herself what she really loved, and the answer was clear.

“I love catering for the celebrations of life, so I moved into being a boutique caterer for weddings and special occasions,” she said. “Cooking 250 meals every week [for events] is a lot easier than chasing sales down for meal prep week after week. It’s more consistent. And I enjoy the party.”

Catering done differently

Larson said her vision with Mindful Fork Catering is to deliver gourmet catering made with primarily local ingredients and prepared in a manner that “lets the food shine on its own.”

“Our goal is to keep the food as local as possible and be chef-driven and creative to show people that real food really does taste better, especially when there is a story connected to it,” she said.

Case in point, Larson said many of her vegetables come from a farmer who grows them about 20 minutes from the business’s operations.

“There’s a story there, as it’s grown with love and care, and you can tell that,” she said. “When we make our [dishes], we try to make them as simply as possible.” 

Larson said that may include vegetables, as they’re “vegetable people – vegetables are my No. 1 thing.”

The process, she said, also extends to every item on the tailored menus, whether that’s meat, vegetables, fruits or something else.

“We have a wonderful connection with a lot of growers in the area, though there are some who aren’t in our backyard,” she said. “I do sometimes travel two hours away to get things from different vendors, but the premise is to eat real food and keep it simple and delicious.”

Saying ‘I do’ to good taste

Though a wedding may feature chicken, Larson said it’s contingent on what each customer wants because, other than the business’s corporate menu, Mindful Fork Catering doesn’t deal in structured menus. 

“I like to talk to clients and learn what they like and don’t like,” she said. “I want their day to be representative of them, and that doesn’t have to be boring chicken. [Menus] are super antiquated and limiting. I want to have a personal connection with my clients.”

That said, Larson said it took a while for customers to come around to the idea of no pre-existing menus for weddings or other celebrations. 

“For the first two years, it was, ‘What do you mean you don’t have a menu?’” she said. “It gives my culinary staff [the ability] to flex.”

Larson said it also allows Mindful Fork Catering to flex alongside the products local farmers happen to have on hand.

For example, she said last year, there weren’t a lot of cucumbers available, but carrots were abundant.

Being receptive to the growing season is a must, she said.

“It’s seasonal, and I don’t know what we’re going to have, because we don’t know what the seasons will bring,” she said.

In addition to weddings, Larson said Mindful Fork Catering also provides catering for baby showers, bridal showers, celebrations of life and businesses with its corporate catering.

“We do way more celebratory events versus corporate – weddings predominantly,” she said. 

Custom-tailored event menus

Though there aren’t specific menus, Larson said that isn’t to say there aren’t favorites among Mindful Fork Catering’s clientele.

She said their loaded mashed potatoes are a fan favorite.

“The mashed potatoes are our No. 1 requested item because hey, it’s potatoes and this is the Midwest,” she said.

Larson said Mindful Fork’s chefs are also well known for their seasonal soups as well as what they term “grazing tables” or grand buffets – which she describes as massive displays of both delicious and visually appealing food.

She said she favors creating those in fall, with the harvest season providing lots of squash and associated fare.

“We love fall – it’s our favorite time and favorite harvest season,” she said.

Larson said the team is known for its stuffed squash – made with garden pasta sauce and Italian sausage stuffed inside a squash to be baked.

The result, she said, tastes a lot like lasagna when it’s served.

Simple, Larson said, does not mean boring by any stretch – noting that once you learn the flavor profiles of different foods, the magic comes in combining a food with the right flair, such as cardamom. 

“Food should never be overcomplicated,” she said. “I love the gastronomy end of the world, as it’s cool, but at the end of the day, it’s not food. Food is meant to be shared during a meal with people important to you, to fuel you. I believe most of the world’s [issues] could be cured by breaking bread and sharing bread with someone, and the ingredients for it should be simple.”

Tastings done differently

Larson said Mindful Fork Catering also doesn’t host individual tastings, but instead hosts regular Tasting Menu Dinners for upward of 40 people each.

She said these provide an opportunity for potential clients to sample a variety of culinary delights they could choose for their own events, while also providing a dining experience for past clients who want to enjoy more of her creations.

Larson said the dinners resonate with her innovative mindset as well.

“I find one-on-one tastings to be antiquated, outdated and cumbersome,” she said. “With these, I can share food with 20 couples in one three- to four-hour span.”

Larson said the atmosphere the Tasting Menu Dinners create is a bonus – as they tend to bring together past clients and fans of Mindful Fork’s food with soon-to-be married couples.

She said the dinners vary, as do their presentation – with family style, sit-down and grand buffet options employed at different times. 

“It’s great because people sit down together and connect over food,” she said.

Catering to a full experience

Though the food is thoughtfully planned for, carefully prepared, set up and served with great care and service, Larson said the Mindful Fork Catering experience isn’t just about the food.

Part of that experience, she said, is the intentionality with which she and her team work with other vendors at any event to ensure everything seamlessly meshes.

Among many other things, Larson said that includes the timing of setup and sticking around. 

“It makes a big difference when vendors work together and care,” she said. “When you have a group that works together for the greater good, it makes things run smoothly. There is a lot of work happening behind the scenes with other vendors.”

Ensuring a stress-free experience, Larson said, is what she and her team aim to deliver, time after time.

“Whether it’s a wedding, a corporate party or a life celebration, it can be stressful,” she said. “My job is for them to never have to worry about anything.”

Larson said when caterers set up and head out, they’re also missing out on what she considers the best part of the whole experience. 

“My favorite part of catering for weddings is the ‘calm after the storm,’ when I hide in the corner to watch it come to life,” she said. “Weeks [to months] of preparation come together for that moment. Whether it’s a marriage, baby shower or celebration of life, there is always a tiny moment to pay attention to.”

Though the wedding season shifts slightly year to year, Larson said it can start as early as the first weekend of May and go until the end of September or even the beginning of October.

This year, she said things kicked off a bit later – in mid-June – and she anticipates they will continue to the beginning of November.

Where weddings and other events take the team varies, Larson said, with a lot of it happening in a radius of River Falls, but there is plenty stretching across state lines and other parts of the state.
“We go all over,” she said. “A lot of the catering in September is booked in the Spooner area, because microweddings are happening at these [luxury rentals] that we’re catering for.”

Relationships build opportunities

To continue to support Mindful Fork Catering’s growth, Larson said she is in the process of purchasing an event venue about an hour and a half away from River Falls.

“I love hosting, and I believe we can offer an affordable place [for events],” she said. “I don’t believe you should have to sell your firstborn child for an elevated and classy venue.”
Even as that acquisition comes together, Larson said Mindful Fork Catering will maintain its operations in River Falls, where it resides within the St. Croix Valley Business Innovation Center.

The center, she said, is where a lot of the behind-the-scenes magic happens – with two kitchen leads and between eight to 10 part-time employees crafting the culinary fare clients enjoy so much. 

Larson said the team’s size can vary a bit depending on what’s happening.

During a late-July weekend, she said the team catered a wedding on that Friday and two events on the Saturday, with 12 team members at just one of the three events to ensure everything worked smoothly. 

“We had people in our kitchen from 6 a.m. to 1 a.m. the following day, as it was massive,” she said. “We had three crews running that day.”

But the creativity behind the work and the experiences it creates, Larson said, fuels the team forward – meal after meal, event after event.

“At the end of the day, food is good because of who you’re sharing it with and if it’s made with purpose and intention,” she said.