This flower farm produces an oil that can do it all.
After months of planting, watering, and tending, Kent and Kathy Brown, their son Phillip, and his wife, Amberlyn, all owners of Show Me HH Farms, have just 10 short days to enjoy their sunflower blooms.
In late August, the flowers will bow their heads, the photography sessions will fade to an end, and the field will be cleared. Though the blooming season will have ended, for the Brown family, the hard work of the harvest season has just begun.
Running the sunflower field as an attraction for the public is a bonus element of the job, while the family’s true passion is transforming their fields of sunflowers into a healthy, multi-purpose oil. The variety of sunflower at Show Me HH Farms is high in oleic acid. This version of the plant produces seed oil that is thought to help inflammation in the body.
The process of making the oil starts the moment the sunflower seeds are harvested. “We start with harvesting our seeds, and that’ll be in late October, early November,” Kent explains. “We want the seeds to dry in the field. We don’t use any insecticide if we can keep from it. We have a seed cleaner on our farm that we just purchased, and it will clean the seed.”
After the seeds are cleaned, the family dumps the dried seeds into 1,000-pound super sacks. Then, the sacks are stacked in their warehouse and clamped shut before being hooked—one bag at a time—onto a seed press. The machine cold-presses the sunflower seed, avoiding the use of chemicals or heat to pull out the oil. It runs through the contents of each bag until it is completely empty, which takes an astounding 30 hours per sack. “I have a feeling we’re going to have 40 to 45 bags this year,” Kent says. “We’re going to spend a tremendous amount of time [pressing], but you can kind of go off and do other farm chores … just make sure something’s not going to run out.”
When the Brown’s began the business in 2021, they thought that they were entering into a huge sunflower oil market in Missouri. According to Kent, they were surprised to learn they were only the second producer in the country to extract sunflower oil. Today, there are several farms doing this. “It’s an all-natural product, and a lot of people are really surprised by that,” Kent says. “We have zero waste, because what comes out of our press is a dry material that is fairly high in protein. We sell that to a family that uses it as a livestock supplement for their sheep and their cattle. Then, when we filter the oil, what comes back out of the filter is used in our sunflower soap.”
Sunflower oil is great to use for cooking, for baking, and in soaps, Kent says. “Sunflower oil is really high in vitamin E and vitamin K, so it’s perfect for soap, and it also has a 450-degree smoke point,” Kent says. High smoke point oils are great for frying, searing, and cooking at high temperatures without the oil smoking or breaking down.
The oil is a healthy option due to being produced from sunflowers that are high in oleic acid, also known as omega-9 (a polyunsaturated fatty acid necessary for brain and heart health) and low in linoleic acid, also known as omega-6 (a polyunsaturated fatty acid that helps with brain function). While the body needs both of these fatty acids, too much omega-6 can lead to an increase in the body’s inflammatory response. “Omega-6s are what usually cause inflammation in your joints, and this is why people try to stay away from seed oil,” Kent says. “But what we use is actually higher in omega-9s.”
Kent says that the majority of people who visit the farm are skeptical about the taste of the sunflower oil. One of his favorite things is giving samples of Show Me HH Farms’ sunflower oil and seeing the faces of visitors when they give it a try. “It has an amazing flavor, a light, mild flavor that is nutty,” Kent says. “We invite them in and show them our operation, and they’re just amazed, especially when we tell them that most of the oil that you purchase at the supermarket is extracted with chemicals.”
When Kent was asked about his favorite part of running the sunflower farm, his immediate answer was, “Meeting the people!” Run as a family operation with Kent, Kathy, Phillip, Amberlyn, and Kent and Kathy’s daughter, Dani Hudson, the team works to provide a healthy sunflower seed oil for customers to enjoy.
Visitors can see the sunflower fields in late July or August. Visit Show Me HH Farms’ Facebook page for open dates and hours. The shop is open year round at 55115 State Highway HH, Hannibal. ShowMeHHFarms.com
Photos by Show Me HH Farms.
This article was originally in Missouri Life’s July/August 2025 edition.
