Report: Vikings eat a lot of crustaceans, a (controversial) MN invention

Welcome back to The Flyover, your daily digest of important, overlooked and/or interesting Minnesota news.

Vikings: Powered by Uncrustables

This highly amusing new investigation from The Athletic features two locally angled bomb hits. First, the Uncrustable was apparently invented by Len Kretchman in Fergus Falls, Minnesota, making the food an underrated Minnesota invention. (Other sources say they were invented in Fargo, North Dakota, but we're trusting The Athletic's reporting here.) Second, the Minnesota Vikings eat staggering amounts of Uncrustables, though not nearly as much as some teams; The gist of the Athletic story is that the crustless pocket sandwich is taking the NFL by storm.

Enjoy this incredible collection of sentences from Kretchman reflecting on his PB&J innovation…

We are not replicating the atomic bomb here. We're trying to make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich… There were two people standing there, goofing off, probably drinking a beer and a glass of wine and saying, “What do you think?” The moon is round, the sun is round, the Earth is round, that's our favorite shape. Do you have to go to a committee and ask people what the form should be? No. It's round. So that's what we've got to the point.

In 1999, a few years after Kretchman and his business partner David Geske concocted Uncrustable, the friends sold their company to Smucker's for $1 million, Fast Company reports. (FC also gives credit to Fargo…for provincial reasons, we'll stick with Fergus Falls!) Today, the brand is worth nearly $1 billion.

Which brings us to today and the number you've all been waiting for: The Minnesota Vikings consume about 200 Uncrustables per week, according to “information gathered by The Athletic.” The sports website estimates that NFL players “at least 80,000 (emphasis theirs) Uncrustables per year, with the Broncos leading the way at 700 (!) per week.

Click here to learn much more about the PB&J consumption habits of the very big men in professional football. And never forget: Minnesota Timberwolves legend Kevin Garnett helped spark the NBA's “secret addiction” to this sandwich genre, as ESPN reported in 2017.

Bad week for (allegedly) bad celebrity chef

Earlier this week, local chef Justin Sutherland pleaded guilty to domestic violence charges stemming from an incident in June in which he allegedly threatened a woman with a gun. Sutherland told Paul Walsh of the Star Tribune that he was “fully prepared to go to court, but I didn't want to give you media vultures the circus you were hoping for.”

Haha, dude, no, definitely. Blame the media, right, the same people who have supported every one of your projects, from Handsome Hog to the overpriced egg sandwich chain. What we're going to remember here is how after your boating accident in 2022, literally every single outlet in town shared your GoFundMe, helping you raise more than $275,000. I'm sure all of these people are thrilled that you choked someone and threatened to shoot them (allegedly, supposedly), meaning they had to publicly dissolve their partnerships with you and so on. Vulture. I hope you had some donations left for your lawyers.

Sutherland's plea would overturn his 360-day sentence in favor of two years of probation, 100 hours of community service and an evaluation of his drug addiction; sentencing would be scheduled for December. But then, on Thursday, Sutherland was arrested againthis time for allegedly violating a no-contact order, according to KARE 11's Felicity Dachel. He was arrested – outside of a Ghost Halloween! — arrested on suspicion of a gross violation of the protective order, according to St. Paul police, and now the Ramsey County District Attorney's Office will decide on new charges.

Meet the doctors improving access to transgender care in MN

The ACLU is currently tracking 530 anti-LGBTQ+ laws across the United States. These include efforts to censor curricula, forced field trips to schools, and bans on gender-affirming youth care. Minnesota has now become something of a haven for trans rights. In this article from NPR, Selena Simmons-Duffin speaks with the medical professionals working to make trans health care in our state the best it can be – for patients from Minnesota and for many in other, more restrictive places.

“For our small clinic alone, we had over 200 people visit from abroad,” says Annie Van Avery, managing director of Family Tree, about last year’s numbers. This can put a strain on both overwhelmed clinics and patients who must travel for treatment and fight insurance agencies for coverage. One way to improve access is through programs that train more providers. Family Tree's Midwest Trans Health Education Network, Simmons-Duffin writes, has trained “approximately 50 health care providers from throughout the region, including in rural areas.”

“You have two options: you can get scared and say, 'I don't know if we can do this,'” says Dr. Kelsey Leonardsmith of Family Tree Clinics. “Or you can take a deep breath and say: We know the work we are doing. We looked at the research. We’ve been doing this for a long time and we do a good job – our patients cry with joy in this building.”

Chugging at full speed: Borealis trains reach 100,000 passengers

Amtrak and state officials from Minnesota, Wisconsin and Illinois issued a news release Thursday celebrating the “overwhelming public interest” in the new Borealis line between St. Paul and Chicago. The trains have attracted 100,000 passengers since their introduction 22 weeks ago. “Reaching 100,000 passengers in less than six months is a testament to the good things that can happen when we provide service that is needed,” said Minnesota Transportation Commissioner Nancy Daubenberger. She's not wrong! Now the US should invest desperately. We needed high-speed rail rather than falling behind the rest of the world, but no one asked us. Anyway, among those 100,000 early Borealis passengers: Racket's Keith Harris, whose trip report you can – and should – read below.