THE STATE OF GRAIN

MY JOURNEY TO FRESHLY MILLED FLOUR

Over a career that has spanned twenty years, I have been fortunate enough to work with some very experienced and generous people. Many of them helped illuminate a whole new culinary approach for me. These lessons, learned throughout my time in the restaurant business, have resulted in a continuing journey into the exploration of whole grains and milling. Here’s how I got to where I am now.

GROWING UP

My mom grew up in a town in upstate New York with a population of 6,000 people. She made her own clothes, hunted for her food, and milled her own flour. In other words, she is a complete badass. That era was the 1980s and whole, organic foods were in fashion, but so were kitchen appliances. Home milling wasn’t super unusual. She would make dough with her freshly milled flour, pop it in a bread machine, and this delicious loaf would come out. I thought it was magic. I spent a lot of time in the kitchen with her and with other members of my family.

When I was fourteen, I got my first job at the Italian Heritage Center, a members-only club in Portland, Maine. It was a huge place with multiple banquet halls, all named after Italian heroes like Columbus and Galileo. It was the ideal spot for a young and inexperienced Italian American kid like me to learn the ropes of the restaurant business. And it was endlessly entertaining seeing all these “Italian” New Englanders with thick Maine accents scarfing down spaghetti and meatballs as if they were in the old country. The food was your standard Italian American fare featuring the greatest hits like veal piccata, lemon chicken, and eggplant Parmesan. We made all the classics. From the moment I started in the kitchen, I was obsessed.

After four years at the Heritage Center—and after graduating from high school—I needed to find a job that paid me more than seven bucks an hour. A cook I knew there offered to get me a gig with his dad working on a ferryboat. The line served Casco Bay, shuttling people and cargo from the Portland mainland to the surrounding islands.

I loved being on the water every day, and the deckhand banter was even more of a sport than cooking, but despite the significant increase in wages, it wasn’t long before I missed being around food. While still working on the ferry, I took a part-time job at Henry VIII, a very popular spot that specialized in a variety of roast beef sandwiches. Each day I would prep forty pounds of top round beef that would cook overnight, low and slow at 140°F, in an Alto-Shaam oven. As simple as the concept was, the preparations were diverse, and before long I was learning how to make hollandaise sauce, mushroom ragù, soups, and chutneys.

The owner, Bruce Rascher, was an interesting dude. He had been raised in France, attended hotel school in Switzerland, and cooked all over the world. To this day I have no idea why he opened a sandwich shop in Portland—he was a properly trained restaurateur and could have made it anywhere. I owe Bruce so much for my appreciation of food, and for encouraging me to go to culinary school. He had a connection at The Restaurant School at Walnut Hill College in Philadelphia, and after one phone call and Bruce’s letter of recommendation, I was on my way.

PHILADELPHIA TO ITALY…AND BACK

I began culinary school in early 2004 with classes five days a week from 6 a.m. until 2 p.m. I arrived feeling pretty confident in the kitchen, but I quickly realized I had a lot to learn. Yes, I made a mean chicken parm, but I had absolutely no idea about anything other than the dishes I’d cooked at my first two jobs.

Knife skills, building sauces, butchering meats, and the basic etiquette of working in a kitchen brigade were all disciplines I would soon employ. I was gaining an essential culinary vocabulary that would be a requirement if I wanted to land a job in a city kitchen, which I ultimately did: Barclay Prime, Striped Bass, Le Bec-Fin, and the Fountain Restaurant at the Four Seasons Hotel—all in Philadelphia.

After having cooked in these top joints and honed my culinary chops, I was feeling pretty proud of myself for becoming part of the Philly restaurant scene. Wanting to impress my girlfriend at the time, I made a reservation at a place called Vetri. I was curious about this tiny spot on Spruce Street that had gained national attention by being named the best Italian restaurant in the country by Alan Richman, the intensely selective critic of GQ magazine.

Vetri more than lived up to all the hype; it exceeded my expectations. I still can remember the two dishes that floored me: One was an asparagus flan with a suspended runny egg yolk in the center. It was light yet sultry and decadent. Then there was chestnut fettuccine with wild boar ragù and cocoa. I almost fell out of my chair, it was so good. Who was this Marc Vetri guy and what was this food I was eating? It certainly was way different from the meals I had cooked at the Italian Heritage Center! I asked for a job on the spot. Awaiting the answer was more nerve-racking than any date!

I jumped in headfirst, but it was a culture shock to say the least, and a true test. Up until that point, I had cooked only in high-volume restaurants that were all about the mise en place, where each dish was portioned out and prepared with expedience in mind. Vetri, on the other hand, was what we in the industry call al momento, with each and every dish made from scratch, start to finish. A turbot with potato torta? We would fillet the whole fish on the spot, peel the spuds then and there, and make the dish from beginning to end. Even the herbs were chopped to order. It was all so new to me and I just couldn’t understand how to cook this way, but after about two months I started to get it together and somehow managed to survive this baptism by fire. Before long, I actually began to enjoy this new kamikaze style of cooking.

Instead of spending the first half of the day prepping and setting up stations, now I was baking bread, making petit fours and chocolates, and preparing a variety of salumi. Each and every day all the kitchen staff were wearing the hats of the baker, pastry chef, and salami maker. It was awesome.

My total ignorance of pastry allowed me to develop the majority of my skills in the kitchen.

I learned very early on that all cooking disciplines in the kitchen are equally important. You can’t be a great sauté cook and not know how to butcher a fish. Whether it’s cleaning vegetables, breaking down a pig, rolling dough, or mopping the floor, it is essential to be complete and consistent in every area. It is this understanding that has given me a less stereotypical approach to working with fresh flour. It has helped me view the craft of baking differently, too. Since I hadn’t spent years tucked away in a restaurant pastry department, or doing the morning grind at a pâtisserie, my total ignorance of pastry allowed me to develop the majority of my skills in the kitchen and on the fly.

After two years at Vetri, an identity crisis set in. I realized that my creativity and inspiration always came from what I ate at home and what I ate at restaurants. I knew how to cook, but I didn’t know how to create something original. My chefs, Brad Spence and Jeff Michaud, were so successful and accomplished. What did I have to contribute? As much as I was learning from them, the idea of cooking Italian food without ever having been to Italy weighed on me. I needed to experience it for myself.

At this time I was reading a book called Piano, Piano, Pieno: Authentic Food from a Tuscan Farm by Susan McKenna Grant that detailed her life running an agriturismo, a working farm with tourist accommodations. The book was an inspiring collection of recipes that also described a sustainable life on her farm, where she reared animals, worked the land, and ran a guesthouse. To my surprise her email address was in the book, and I decided to reach out. I was amazed when within days she responded with an invitation to come work for her in Tuscany.

I told Marc of my intentions and offered as long a notice as he would need to fill my position at the restaurant. As his sous-chef, leaving wasn’t something I took lightly. But, as any great mentor would do, he gave me great advice. He said as life-changing as working on Susan’s farm in Italy might be, I would learn more as a chef if I cooked in a serious restaurant there instead. He told me he knew just the place. So at age twenty-six I was on my way to Bergamo, Italy, to work at Osteria della Brughiera. My time there was a revelation from the start. As any young Italian American cook might, I became fully intoxicated by the country itself. But more than that, I found myself learning daily lessons from professionals who were not only serious about their craft but also incredibly practiced and disciplined. These guys were carrying on traditions in the right way, the best way, and the way generations had been doing it before them. Everything they taught me—how to shape pasta, how to make a real panettone, even how to pull a perfect cappuccino—set a course for me that has been invaluable.

I loved Bergamo and had every intention of staying there. My Italian was getting good, and I loved the laid-back yet dynamic lifestyle. But then I got a call from Marc Vetri. He asked me if I was interested in coming back to Philly and taking a position as chef de cuisine. He was revamping the restaurant and wanted me to collaborate with him. It was an offer I couldn’t refuse.

Before long I was back stateside, plotting and planning with Marc on how we could make Vetri even better. We wanted it to be not just a fine-dining place for Philadelphians, but rather the type of spot that would stand up nationally and hold its own with any Italian restaurant in New York and beyond. The first thing we decided was to turn Vetri from à la carte dining into a serious tasting-menu-only destination restaurant. With only thirty seats, we felt we had a real opportunity to make it a true culinary showcase. Mirroring Osteria della Brughiera, everything we did was handmade and we were committed to constant improvement.

For the first time ever, I felt that the noodle could be—should be—the star of the show in a pasta dish.

Our hard work paid off. In 2012 Vetri was named a James Beard Foundation Award finalist for Outstanding Restaurant, Travel + Leisure named us among the Best Italian Restaurants in the United States, and I was named one of Forbes magazine’s 30 Under 30 professionals in the food and wine industry. Now we were cooking! In spite of all these accolades, working at Vetri taught me never to rest on my laurels and I continued to learn as much as I could, especially through books. During my second year as chef de cuisine, I read Cooking by Hand by Paul Bertolli, the legendary California chef and Chez Panisse alum. I had been making pasta all along, but after reading his book, I couldn’t get his words about milling grain out of my mind. I was haunted in the best way by romantic notions of Old World cooking. Eventually I went to Fante’s, a hundred-year-old kitchen shop in South Philly’s historic Italian Market, and bought a small mill for the restaurant. It scared me, mainly because it seemed like an ancient machine that might be too difficult to master. But I started experimenting, and before long I was milling flour every day.

From the very start I was amazed by the results. The fresh flour I was making for pasta was good enough to eat raw, and for the first time ever, I felt that the noodle could be—should be—the star of the show in a pasta dish, with the sauce playing the supporting role. As inspired as I was, I was terrified of transitioning the restaurant to freshly milled flour. I played the pitch over and over in my head: “Hey Marc, let’s do only wacky pasta dishes and charge guests $150 for the tasting menu.” It sounded just crazy enough for him to kill me. I didn’t want to torpedo our successful new formula at the rejuvenated Vetri, which was enjoying a great reception. But I started gradually putting fresh-milled pastas on the menu, paying close attention to how guests responded.

At first it was just one: pappardelle alfredo, an egg yolk–rich noodle slathered in cream from Green Meadow Farm in Gap in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, and dusted with Parmigiano-Reggiano from Hombre, the source for Massimo Bottura of Osteria Francescana in Modena and the Pope himself. It was a doubly safe and cautious move: everyone loves alfredo, so a cheeky riff with a wide noodle was hardly a reliable barometer. Nevertheless, it was a hit. Every plate came back clean and guests were actually commenting on the noodles themselves. Then I added ravioli with ricotta, lemon zest, and nutmeg. Our diners had the same reaction. I knew I was onto something.

Coincidentally, around the same time, Marc’s friend chef Dan Barber emailed him an invitation to a seed conference he was hosting at Blue Hill Stone Barns that would feature forward-thinking discussions on wheat. The list of attendees was a who’s who of top chefs from around the world, including Massimo Bottura and René Redzepi of Noma in Copenhagen. Marc went, of course, and he was blown away. Needless to say, after the conference he became a bit more interested in the flour experiments I had been doing. He couldn’t stop telling me all he’d learned and he kept talking about this genius of a guy he’d met from Washington State University named Dr. Stephen Jones, the founder of the Bread Lab and one of the planet’s foremost authorities on grains and flour. In spite of his academic focus, Dr. Jones made a major effort to reach out to chefs and kitchens across America to give his research a practical application. Within a week Marc was on a plane to the West Coast to visit him.

His work gave us a much deeper understanding of the history of the grain and how it evolved from whole wheat to the white flour everyone uses today.

Over the next two years, Dr. Jones schooled us on wheat and flour at his Bread Lab at WSU. Not only did his work inspire our cooking in the restaurant, but it also gave us a much deeper understanding of the history of the grain and how it evolved from whole wheat to the white flour everyone uses today. It also opened up a vast network of mills and farmers that have been dedicated to fresh stone milling in reaction against the commodity flour industry. Soon my life was consumed with visits to mills all over the country. Some mills were right in our backyard. Just down the road in Bucks County, Fran and Mark Fischer’s Castle Valley Mill supplied us with gorgeous stone-milled flour for bread and pasta. Farther away was Hayden Flour Mills in Arizona, which transformed my understanding of how pizza and pastry flour could behave.

One of the historical grains Dr. Jones worked with extensively was Red Russian wheat. With a distinctively bold flavor and a robust and resilient performance in the field, after years of testing it still yielded mediocre results when baked. As much as Dr. Jones and his team tried, the bread they produced was repeatedly unsatisfactory. His bakers had learned that when milled and mixed into a dough, Red Russian created a flabby mess. As all bakers know, the balance between elasticity and extensibility is key, and this stuff just wouldn’t “bounce” back. You would stretch it while shaping and it would just remain all stretched out.

When Marc and I heard this, we thought, “Let’s try making pasta with it!” We brought a bag of Red Russian back to Philly and got to work. The results were beautiful. We concluded that the gluten in the Red Russian wheat, although high in protein, was probably a weaker gluten and its structure was not strong enough to make bread. But for pasta it was perfect, most notably in its flavor. Even a plain noodle like fettuccine with no accompaniment was unbelievable. The high-protein flour also didn’t require the amount of egg usually needed to get that “bite” you want from fresh pasta. For us, it was a groundbreaking revelation. Vetri was on its way to being the only Italian restaurant “bringing grain back” by using fresh flour across the whole menu.

THE BIG APPLE

After three years as chef de cuisine at Vetri, I felt it was time to move on and do my own thing. In 2015, I landed a dream job: to open a restaurant and manage all the food service in the Williamsburg Hotel in Brooklyn. The project started off with some pop-ups to test out menu items while the property was being built. This was fun initially, but I had come to New York to propel my career forward, not just to do pop-ups. The hotel still hadn’t opened late that year. The owners were developing a city block into office spaces in Bushwick, a couple miles from the hotel. They asked me if I had any ideas for using part of it in the meantime. I pitched the Brooklyn Bread Lab, a space where I could continue to build on the milling techniques I had learned at Vetri, develop recipes for the hotel, and teach some classes on bread and pasta making. A month later, we were up and running.

I was giddy at the prospect of bringing milling back to Brooklyn. It had been decades since there was a functioning artisanal mill in the borough—eighty years, according to June Russell, head of the Greenmarket Regional Grains Project. I bought a stone mill that was by far the largest I had ever worked with; the pink granite stones weighed 500 pounds each and were driven by a 5-horsepower motor. For over a year, I used it to make flour for bread, pizza, pasta, and pastries. I was eager to open the hotel and feed all these wonderful freshly-milled-flour dishes to a wider audience. But after nearly two years of treading water in Brooklyn, the hotel had opened only one of its eight floors and the budget to finish the kitchen build-out was dried up. The gig wasn’t going to pan out, so I took a job as the executive chef at Sessanta, in SoHo’s SIXTY hotel.

In August 2017, five months into my tenure at Sessanta, my time there was cut short and my whole career trajectory was shaken up. A week later, I was on a plane to Germany and after a few months there, I was back in New York and plotting my next flour move, an opportunity I could hardly have imagined: my own restaurant (called Leonti!), on Manhattan’s Upper West Side. The bread, pasta, and pastries are the product of years of contemplating the kind of creative modern Italian cuisine that makes New Yorkers feel nourished and nurtured. I hope you’ll join me for a slice of bread, a forkful of pasta, or a sliver of cake.

HOW PROCESSING GRAIN HAS CHANGED

When I first started experimenting on a home mill at Vetri, I was immediately blown away by the results. The flavors of whatever I made were more intense, bolder, brighter, and just…better. It prompted questions that perplex me to this day: Why are we still using commodity flour from a supermarket or warehouse that was milled months or even years ago? Why do so many renowned and respected chefs, pastry chefs, bakers, and passionate home cooks choose to use it? Here’s the hard truth: nearly all the baked goods we’ve been eating in the United States for the better part of a century and a half have been made with commodity flour. And until recently, there wasn’t much choice for the average person. That is starting to change now—and I am hoping to do my part to promote a conversation about milling and grains. But how did we get here? It’s tempting to think that the current state of grain is a recent occurrence and that if we could just go back to the way our grandparents ate, we could reclaim the flavors and nutrition of their youth. But our grandparents ate bad flour products, too. And so did their grandparents.

At the turn of the nineteenth century, wheat was planted mainly along the Eastern Seaboard, in the Southwest, and in Southern California. There were thousands of small mills across these regions—nearly 25,000 by the mid-eighteenth century—each milling diverse, locally cultivated wheats from the Old and New Worlds according to millennia-old stone-grinding technology. The flour produced by these mills was used to create nutrient-rich breads with exceptional flavor, but it couldn’t travel very far due to the perishable nature of the wheat bran and germ.

Over the course of the early to mid-nineteenth century, grains and recipes migrated to America from Europe, along with new milling techniques. The roller-mill technology that initiated the industrial flour revolution was adapted in Hungary and introduced into the United States during this time. The roller mill was a modified version of a medieval Indian invention and its advent wasn’t nefarious in and of itself. In fact, if the mechanism had been able to do its job without stripping out the nutrients, it would have been the greatest invention since sliced bread. After all, commodity milling produced more food for more people, and the flour’s long shelf life meant it would be available whenever needed. Back then, the importance and nutritional value of vitamins, antioxidants, and fiber in grains was generally unknown.

With the rise of roller milling, white flour was marketed as more prestigious, and whole or darker flours were dismissed as too rustic and were relegated to the urban and rural poor. The commercial obsession with white flour was pervasive, but not without its skeptics. In the mid-nineteenth century, temperance advocate and minister Sylvester Graham preached a vegetarian diet—a radical concept at the time—based on home-milled whole grains. His eponymous invention, the Graham cracker, was a flavorful interruption to his otherwise bland diet. Possibly thanks to his strict diet, he died at age fifty-seven—a full twenty years beyond the average life span at the time—in 1851. Despite his small following, his teachings continued to resonate for a short time, but ultimately were overcome by large-scale farming. Soon the nation’s thousands of small gristmills were shuttered as cheap commodity flour flowed by the ton from massive roller mills.

By the 1880s, industrial methods and their resulting commodity flour had solidified their total market domination, and grain stripped of its bran and germ (see this page)—and therefore its nutrients—was the standard. This so-called white flour could be milled quickly and in huge quantities, and thanks to the absence of bran and germ it would not spoil, thereby creating a more commercially viable, shelf-stable product. The rise of railroads ensured that white flour could travel to every corner of the country and before long, unhealthy, flavorless flour was everywhere.

By the early twentieth century, large-scale farming and milling dominated the grain market and the number of commercial stone mills in the United States had dwindled to around two hundred. Americans were eating bread, pizza, pasta, and pastry made almost exclusively from commodity flour that was in the best cases nutrition-free and in the worst cases was pumped with chemicals to inhibit fungal growth.

A silver lining in all this gloom is that while we have an undoubtedly sick commodity flour market, small commercial stone mills and home millers are growing in number.

Today the flour industry is, in a word, broken. But there is a silver lining in all this gloom: the number of small commercial stone mills and home millers is increasing. In spite of—or perhaps because of—commodity flour production, a growing number of millers, bakers, farmers, food safety advocates, and cooks are embracing a new way of growing and milling grains. The movements are numerous and diverse and scattered across the country; Maine, upstate New York, the Carolinas, the Pacific Northwest, Kansas, and Arizona are all home to thriving milling communities that are championing a small grain renaissance.

One of the nation’s foremost authorities on wheat and wheat breeding is Dr. Stephen Jones, founder of Washington State University’s Bread Lab. Since launching the program in 2010, Dr. Jones has trained students and farmers to grow and study different varieties of wheat, examine their properties, and assess how they would be useful to bakers, chefs, and home cooks. His decision to draw chefs into a conversation that was traditionally held by scientists was nothing short of revolutionary.

Meanwhile in New York, June Russell, head of the Greenmarket Regional Grains Project, built a phenomenal initiative that connects farmers and millers to chefs, bakers, and brewers. Such a network might seem unsurprising today, but getting it up and running was twenty years in the making; now, for the first time in some eighty years, city dwellers have access to a steady supply of local grains.

These ambassadors for the whole-grain movement have different motives, from reviving long-lost family traditions to promoting food sovereignty. What excites me about the movement is that there are so many points of view driving quality and innovation. And what motivates me to proselytize for whole grains is that I have seen that in order to keep the culture going, we have to be enthusiastic, vigilant, and a little loud. And I have no doubts that we are promoting a better way to farm, mill, and eat.

THE WILL TO MILL

Milling is the process of transforming grains into flour using—you guessed it—a mill. Here is a description of the various milling technologies, with suggestions on which mill will work best for you. With that information in mind, you can equip yourself with the tools you will need to start milling yourself.

TYPES OF MILLS

There are several different types of mills on the market—technically speaking, meat grinders, pepper grinders, and even your own teeth qualify—but not all of them are ideal for milling wheat for baking and cooking. Let’s take a look at what’s out there.

Stone Mills

Stone mills feature a circular bed stone, which is fixed to a platform. A runner stone of equal size spins on top of it, driven by animal, water, or electric power. As the runner stone turns, it cuts the grain into pieces, the size of which is determined by how close together or far apart the two stones are positioned. The resulting flour, consisting of milled bran, germ, and endosperm, is pushed into a series of tapered furrows and grooves that are cut into the stone. These act like a funnel to move the flour away from the mill and into a receptacle for collection. Although this is the most primitive form of milling, dating back to antiquity, stone-milling technology is the most reliable in terms of preserving the grain’s nutritional integrity, as long as the mill doesn’t heat up to more than 110°F through friction.

Hammer Mills

As the name suggests, the hammer mill works by repeatedly striking the grain. It was invented in China in the fourth century and was historically used in Europe’s iron workshops until it was adapted for food production. Its metal pieces bang on grain and other products to break them into small fragments. It is especially adapted to transforming corn or wheat into animal feed, which is indeed a major destination for American grains. It could hypothetically be used to transform grains into a fine powder, which would be great for cakes, but I wouldn’t recommend it.

Roller Mills

The roller mill first appeared on the Indian subcontinent in the Middle Ages and was used mainly for grinding sugar and processing cotton. In the nineteenth century, the roller method was adapted in Europe and the United States for milling wheat. These mills consist of two or more cylinders, somewhat resembling large ribbed rigatoni, that spin in opposite directions at different speeds, stripping away the bran and germ, leaving the crushed endosperm (in other words, white flour) in their wake. The mill works quickly and gained popularity for its efficiency and ability to create a nonperishable product (aided by the absence of bran and germ, the flour is practically inert).

Roller mills are favored by industry, and the vast majority of the commodity flour on the market is ground in one. They produce a shelf-stable white flour that has been stripped of its flavor, character, and nutrients. Roller mills aren’t available for home use and even if they were, I wouldn’t want to use the flavorless flour they produce.

Burr Mills

You probably already have a burr mill in your kitchen cabinet. Most pepper mills and many coffee grinders work on the burr system, in which interwoven metal teeth crush the product. The process generates some heat and is not the most efficient way to mill large quantities of flour, but my buddy the documentary filmmaker and flour enthusiast JD McLelland uses a burr mill outfitted with a custom cooling system, which helps him maintain the integrity of the wheat as he mills. Unfortunately, this homemade rigging isn’t for sale. I stick to a burr mill for making rice flour (see this page) and never use one for milling wheat.

BUYING A MILL

When it comes to buying a mill, stick to stone. You have a few options depending on your needs, space constraints, and budget. Whether you’re a professional or a beginner, the Mockmill attachment to KitchenAid, Kenmore, AEG, and Electrolux mixers is a great option and one of the most affordable, costing around $200. It can mill grains as well as corn, legumes, and coffee—most things that a full-scale mill does—but it’s more efficient for smaller amounts. I have found that, in spite of factory specifications, which report on the conservative side, you can mill up to 10 pounds of flour in an hour. You can use the Mockmill for any recipe in this book. Thanks to the portability of a stand mixer, you can move it around more easily than the heavier mills described below. The Mockmill 100 and 200 models sit on your countertop and are good for milling small amounts of flour, though they generate a great deal of heat when the motor runs for a long time. The Mockmill Professional 100 and 200 models have specialty self-cooling motors designed to run nonstop.

For a step up in price and a more nostalgic design, the KoMo Magic Grain Mill starts at $439 for a 3-inch millstone sheathed in beechwood. It can be used for milling grains, legumes, and coffee. The KoMo mill sits on the tabletop and is about the same size as a blender, so it can be stored in a cabinet. It works off a small motor and can mill about 18 pounds of flour in an hour.

For professional kitchens, I recommend the Meadows 8-inch mill. You can choose between a 1- and a 2-horsepower motor. If you’re milling mostly soft wheat, go for the 1-horsepower motor. If you are planning to mill mainly hard wheat, get the 2-horsepower motor. Naturally, if you’re working with a mix of the two, choose the more powerful motor. This mill can produce 50 pounds of flour in an hour, which is more than most restaurants need, but it would be great for a bakery or a pizzeria. The mill’s full dimensions vary according to the model. I like the model measuring 32 × 34 × 57 inches, which also has a stand for a flour bag. The millstone weighs 250 pounds, so it’s not easy to move around; keep that in mind when positioning it in your work space. It retails from $2,500.

Although all these mills can grind legumes and rice, I often mill these separately in a burr mill or another type of coffee-grinding equipment. You’ll need to mill dried fava beans into flour for the Sourdough Durum Loaf (this page) and rice into flour for dusting that loaf as well as the Yeasted Loaf (this page) and for making the Shortbread Cookies (this page) and the Rice Flour Mixture (this page).

MILL MAINTENANCE

If possible, avoid running your mill without feeding grain into it. The very first time you use your mill, mill about 5 pounds of cheap wheat berries and discard the flour. This will clean out any stone dust. To begin milling for edible flour production, turn the mill on and calibrate the machine according to the manufacturer’s instructions. Turn the dial to draw the stones together until they barely touch, then gently back them off. Turn the machine off until it has cooled down completely. Turn the mill back on. Working with 1 cup of grain at a time, test the mill for the desired fineness; then adjust the stones until your flour reaches the coarseness or fineness you are looking for.

When you mill soft wheat as opposed to hard wheat (see this page), you can pull the stones farther apart and still get the fineness you want for your flour, allowing you to run the mill at a faster speed while reducing the heat created through friction. Less heat preserves the integrity of the grain while reducing the risk of the mill sparking and starting a fire.

A beautiful thing about millstones is that they are made of a durable material, and with a little maintenance, they can last for a long time—even centuries. Maintenance is basic. Before and after milling, dust the stones with a clean, dry kitchen towel. Never use soap or water to clean the mill. Store your mill in a dry place.

CUSTOMIZING FLOUR

Bran is a key source of flavor and fiber in pasta and baked goods, but its structure—it behaves somewhat like a sharp blade when mixed into dough—can disrupt gluten development. For that reason, many recipes in this book feature extracted, or sifted, flour. Chapter openers will let you know the amount of bran to use—this will be stated as a percentage of bran inclusion. And ingredients lists for individual recipes will indicate where this percentage varies from the initial chapter instructions.

A flour with 100% inclusion is a whole wheat flour, while a flour with 30% inclusion has had 70% of its bran sifted out, or extracted. To sift the bran out of the flour, you’ll need a #70 mesh sieve, which costs about $100 at specialty retailers, but you can substitute a pollen sifter, available online for closer to $35. When milling extracted flour at home, sift out the bran using the sieve, then reintroduce the recommended percentage of bran by weight back into the flour.

HEAT

Stone-milled flour is produced through friction, which generates heat. The finer the flour, the more heat is generated through friction. If I am milling superfine flour, I will pass wheat berries through the mill twice—the first time on a very coarse setting and the second time on a finer setting. Whatever the fineness of the flour I am aiming for, I always mill wheat berries straight out of the fridge. Constantly monitor the temperature of the flour with a probe thermometer, taking care to keep it below 110°F. If you see the temperature climb, back up the stones and mill more coarsely.

SAFETY

Always refer to the mill manufacturer’s instructions before getting started. When milling, avoid wearing a tie, necklace, or any garment that could get caught in the machine. Pull back long hair. Never leave the mill running unattended.

WORDS TO KNOW

AUTOLYZE: A pre-hydration period in which flour and water are mixed together and allowed to rest before any other ingredients get involved. This one-on-one time hydrates the flour thoroughly and activates the enzymes that help with the bread-making process. It also allows you to do less mixing when you add the other ingredients.

CRUMB: A bread’s internal structure. It can be airy and open, dense and closed, or somewhere in between. Crumb is affected by a number of factors, including the flour’s strength, the length of time a dough ferments, and the amount of water in the dough.

EXTENSIBILITY: The degree to which a dough can be stretched without breaking. Certain flours (such as Sonora and Red Russian) have good extensibility.

EXTRACTION: Passing flour through a sieve to remove the bran; also known as “sifting.”

INCLUSION: The percentage of bran by weight in flour.

LAMINATING: The process of folding and rolling butter into dough to create a pastry featuring dough layers separated by strata of butter. Whole Wheat Croissants (this page) and Puff Pastry (this page) are the ultimate examples of this type of pastry.

LEVAIN: A sourdough starter made by mixing flour and water and allowing them to ferment naturally as yeasts and bacteria in the environment and in the freshly milled wheat seed itself “infect” the mixture. Levain may be used on its own for fermenting doughs or in combination with commercial yeast.

SEMOLINA: A coarse grind of durum wheat that is often used for dusting peels or kitchen towels used to wrap pasta dough.

STARCH QUALITY: The ability of the starch in a flour to absorb water without breaking down. Good starch quality signifies a flour that keeps its integrity in a high-hydration dough.

WHEAT BERRIES: Cleaned and dried whole kernels that can be milled into flour.

ALL ABOUT WHEAT

Without being hyperbolic I can confidently say that wheat is one of the most important foods on Earth. Virtually every civilization relies on wheat in some form for nutrition and calories.

WHAT’S WHEAT?

Wheat is a grain that was domesticated in the Fertile Crescent, a fecund area in the Middle East, more than 10,000 years ago. Over the past ten millennia, wheat has moved from the banks of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers to every continent but Antarctica. It is among the most widely grown foods in the world. Today it ranks third among US agricultural products, behind corn and soybeans.

THE LIFE OF WHEAT

The size and shape of the grains may vary, but all wheat berries are made up of the same basic components: bran, germ, and endosperm. The bran is the fibrous shell that encases the seed, accounting for about 14% of the seed’s total weight. Bran transmits a tremendous amount of flavor and is a source of fiber, which aids in digestion. The germ, essentially the seed’s embryo, accounts for 2.5% of the grain’s weight. The remaining weight is endosperm, a component rich in protein and carbohydrates but rather lacking in flavor. Unsifted flour is whole wheat, while extracted flour has been sifted to eliminate the bran and germ. It is pure endosperm, or white flour.

The wheat plant is formed of a stalk, which in turn grows seeds. In order to thrive, wheat requires only water, sunshine, and soil, so it has adapted to numerous climates—though certain wheats do better in particular environments or perform differently in disparate climates (see this page). As it grows and matures, the wheat kernel turns from green to beige, golden, reddish, or even purple-tinged. When the wheat is ready to be harvested, farmers cut the grain down—in the past they would use a scythe but today they use a machine called a combine—and then process it. Depending on the scale of the farming facility, a farmer may clean, separate, and dry the seed or entrust these steps to a miller. In either case, the next stage is extracting the seeds from the chaff, a scaly protective casing also known as the hull.

The hull is removed through a tumbling process that gently massages it off the seed while airflow blows it away, separating the hull from the grain. After the hull is removed and discarded, the grain is inspected once again and separated from field debris (such as other seeds) using either a series of perforated plates that separate items of unlike sizes or pneumatic air chambers. Next, the grain is dried with currents of warm or hot air, ideally over hours or even days. Controlling the temperature is key to keeping the grain healthy: any temperature over 110°F damages the seed’s internal structure. Industrial drying units can reach 180°F; big roller-mill plants (see this page) don’t need to preserve the seed’s energy and structure because the entire industrial flour industry relies on the long shelf life of essentially dead flour. Stone mills (see this page), on the other hand, capture all the nutritious parts of the grain, and the nutrition of the resulting flour is preserved if it is dried in low-temperature drying chambers. Because wheat kernels are live seeds, the drying process is an important step for preserving them; a properly dried kernel can be shelf stable for years. When the seed is dried to a 12% to 15% moisture content, it is resistant to rancidity and sprouting and can be milled for human or animal consumption when the time comes.

WHEAT STATS

No two grain harvests are identical. Some farms and mills provide the following key specs on their packaging or websites, or can furnish them upon request, allowing you to track these variables and use them to modify recipes as needed. Here are some of the figures you might encounter:

Protein Count

The amount of protein present in wheat species ranges from 8% to 17%; the overall protein content depends on both the genetics of the individual grain species and the conditions in which the grain has grown. A flour from a Sonora soft wheat grown in California may have a slightly different protein content than one from a Sonora grown in Arizona. Similarly, if you grow emmer in a dry climate, it has a greater net protein content than grain from the very same seeds grown in a wet climate, as rain “washes away” protein. While rainfall, climate, and farming techniques all influence the final characteristics of the wheat, there are some baselines. For example, durum’s protein content may vary, but it rarely drops below 12%, regardless of where or how it grows.

Gluten protein accounts for 75% to 85% of a wheat’s total protein content. When gluten protein comes into contact with water, two compounds are activated: glutenins and gliadins, which give the milled wheat elasticity and extensibility, respectively. The ratio of glutenins to gliadins influences the gluten strength, making certain flours better adapted to either rising or stretching—or both or neither. Common practice calls for a protein content of 11.5% to 14% in flour for bread baking. But by using baking techniques like higher hydration, levain, and cold fermentation, you can achieve a similar product with a flour with lower protein without sacrificing structure or flavor. Managing a grain’s characteristics is essential to freestyle baking, but the recipes in this book address the basics for choosing the best one for the job.

Falling Number

The falling number of a wheat, also known as the Hagberg Number, was developed as a way of analyzing how its resulting flour would perform. The definition of this internationally standardized figure, which is measured on a scale of zero to 500, is especially useful for guessing a flour’s potential enzymatic activity. For example, a low Hagberg Number signifies reduced milling quality.

Since fresh grains are viable seeds, they are filled with enzymes that provide the energy to make a planted seed grow. When a seed is instead milled into flour, mixed with water and yeast, and fermented, the enzymes in the seed become fuel for the yeast and propel the fermentation process. The resulting dough captures the product of that energy transition in its gluten network. This energy can be quantified with lab tests; the lower the number, the more enzymatic activity present in the grain.

A plant contains a lot of enzymatic activity as it’s growing. Generally speaking, a grain harvested and milled young will have lots of activity and a lower falling number, while an older harvest will result in a higher number on the scale. There are some exceptions, however. An older harvest that experienced certain environmental triggers like high humidity, excessive rainfall, or “cold shock” brought on by frost can exhibit a low falling number. Whether shopping for whole grains or milled flour, look for products with a falling number around 250, which is ideal for fermenting doughs. A falling number above 350, generally speaking, needs help to ferment since it is not as active; bakers often add sugar or malt syrup or another fuel to compensate for the lack of enzymatic activity. Anything under 200 is considered very active, difficult to tame, and apt to cause a dough to overferment.

A falling number outside the ideal range does not necessarily signal that the grain was unhealthy when it was harvested; instead it could indicate that it was not harvested at the ideal time. Sometimes farmers have to harvest early or late to accommodate weather events, leading to less-than-optimal falling number statistics. Some farms and mills furnish this figure on their packaging or websites or upon request after scientific testing.

To ascertain the falling number, a lab will make a slurry with flour and water, drop it into a test tube, and time how long it takes to break down. When I get a shipment of flour, I do my own version of this test, making a little dumpling with flour and water. I drop it in water and time how long it takes to break down. The quicker it dissolves, the more active the sample. Another test I do is to make a simple dough from flour and water, set it aside, and check it throughout the day, pulling and stretching it to see how it behaves as it ages. This primitive test will give me an idea of whether the enzymatic activity is slow, medium, or fast; if the dough holds together, the activity is slow or medium, whereas if it falls apart, the activity is fast. Neither experiment is as precise as a lab analysis, of course, but it gives me an idea of how active the flour is. Based on the guesstimated activity, I can adjust the amount of yeast or sourdough starter I add to a dough.

Water Absorption

The percentage of a flour’s weight that it can absorb in water is measured with a farinograph, a tool that analyzes the amount of water a flour’s starch can hold before it becomes saturated and indicates how long a dough can be hydrated before it breaks down. This is particularly important for working with durum wheats, which generally deteriorate more rapidly than other wheats if they are too hydrated.

Some farms and mills provide water absorption statistics, but most small operations, including the majority of the mills listed in the Resources section (this page), don’t have the instruments to do so. To determine it in my own semi-scientific way, I mix flour and water together and monitor how the slurry deteriorates over the course of a day.

The presence or absence of bran affects water absorption; bran is thirsty and sucks up a lot of water, so a whole wheat flour with 100% bran inclusion (see this page) will take up to 10% more water than a sifted flour of the same grain variety.

WHEAT VARIETIES

Around 30,000 varieties of wheat exist, but relatively few are grown commercially. Wheat falls into two broad families: Triticum aestivum, common wheat, which accounts for around 95% of global production, and Triticum durum, durum wheat. In the United States, farmers categorize wheats based on color, growing season, and hardness. The permutations created by these overlapping categories are dizzying, so I have tried to simplify the topic as much as possible, focusing only on the types of wheat used in this book.

Red Versus White

The kernels of red wheats have a reddish hue from pigment found mainly in the bran, while white wheats are golden or cream colored. Most wheats are either white or red. There are some exceptions, such as Blue Beard durum, which has a purplish color, and rye, which is silvery. The colors used to describe wheat are simply descriptors and are not related to quality or flavor.

Winter Versus Spring

Winter wheats are planted in the fall and sprout 4 to 6 inches before falling into a hibernation period of sorts called vernalization, when the temperature falls below 40ºF or 50ºF. The plants aren’t actually slumbering, but rather undergoing a series of internal reactions that will facilitate their growth come spring. As soon as the soil warms, the plants become active again and grow until they mature and are harvested in the summer. Spring wheats are planted when the ground thaws in the spring and they typically mature faster than winter wheats. They are also harvested in the summer. Because winter wheats have an extended growing season, they deplete more of their nutrients and therefore generally have lower protein (10% to 12% on average) than spring wheats (12% to 14% on average). The higher protein content of spring wheats generally translates into greater gluten potential, which allows you to make breads or pizza doughs that ferment for a long time and can trap lots of air.

Hard Versus Soft

Grain hardness is just that. Hard wheats are more difficult to mill than soft wheats; their components are more densely packed into the endosperm cells. Hard wheats have high protein and gluten potential, which makes them ideal for yeasted breads that must trap carbon dioxide in their gluten network. They can be used for a wide range of baked goods, too. Soft wheats, on the other hand, contain a high proportion of carbohydrate and relatively low gluten potential, making them a good choice for more delicate baked items like pastry and cakes.

WHEAT SPECIES

Each variety of wheat has its own advantages. One isn’t better than another, although certain wheats work better for certain recipes, either on their own or as a blend. There is also variation in the same grain grown in different climates, as well as variation in the same crop from one year to the next. Hard winter wheat that grows in New Jersey isn’t going to have a high protein content when compared with the same wheat grown in the Arizona desert, but it may end up having the same protein content as a Kansas Turkey wheat grown in—you guessed it—Kansas. Getting to know the characteristics and potential of each grain will help you understand my flour choices in each recipe and eventually help you to make your own choices.

Ancient Grains

Over the past decade or so, ancient grains, so called because they were domesticated thousands of years ago, have surged in popularity. Many such grains are low-yield, low-demand, and quite expensive. Therefore they require a concerted effort on the part of farmers, bakers, millers, and consumers to help them survive in the marketplace. This has driven marketing campaigns that suggest they are superior to all other grains.

There is an objective benefit to eating ancient grains. In fact, they are easier to process than modern grain varietals thanks to their low molecular weight. Additionally, they offer great flavor because they haven’t had taste inadvertently bred out of them in favor of performance and yield, as many modern grains have.

EINKORN (triticum monococcum) has a high protein content but is low in gluten potential. There are only a handful of einkorn producers in the United States, and at a wholesale cost of around $3.50 a pound the grain is more expensive than pork! I have a tough time making bread with it on its own, so I like mixing it with other flours. Commercially, einkorn is also labeled “enkir” or “farro piccolo.”

SPELT (triticum spelta) is high in protein—averaging around 13% to 14%, it’s about the same as durum—but low in gluten. It has a subtly sweet and nutty flavor, and indeed, bakers and chefs use it as much for its taste as they do for its protein. Commercially, spelt is sometimes called “farro grande.”

RYE (secale cereale) is categorized by some farmers, bakers, and institutions as wheat, while others draw a distinction. As its binomial nomenclature suggests, it is not part of the Triticum genus, but it is a close relative of wheat, and it is an ancient grain that originated in central Anatolia in the Iron Age. It has a sweet, nutty flavor that shines through whether you ferment it to bake bread or use it unfermented in pasta or cookie dough. The fiber-rich cereal is low in gluten potential and for centuries has been the cornerstone of Central and Eastern European and Scandinavian baking traditions, so for our purposes I have included it here.

Hard Winter Wheat

Some recipes in this book simply list “hard winter wheat flour” as an ingredient, but I always list my preferred flour alongside. In these cases, you can use the suggested wheat or any other from this category. When shops, farms, and mills are selling a well-known wheat variety like the ones mentioned below, sometimes they explicitly state the variety on the label, and sometimes they simply label the package generically as “Hard Winter Wheat,” without referring to a specific type. Some companies prefer to keep things simple for customers who might otherwise be wary of unfamiliar wheat varieties. Although the marketplace is changing, perceived consumer response still guides grain and flour labeling.

EDISON HARD WINTER WHEAT is a collaborative breeding effort from autodidact wheat breeder Merrill Lewis and WSU’s Bread Lab. It grows mainly in the Pacific Northwest and the Northeast and imparts delicate, buttery flavors. I recommend it for pizza doughs.

Hard Red Winter Wheat

Grown in the High Plains, especially in Kansas, hard red winter wheat is high in protein and strong in gluten potential. It’s great for buns, rolls, and yeasted loaves. Several types are used in the recipes in this book.

WARTHOG HARD RED WINTER WHEAT averages around 11% protein and has an intense wheat flavor. It’s an all-around solid performer, bringing strength, good starch quality, and extensibility to doughs. I recommend it for yeasted and sourdough breads.

RED FIFE HARD RED WINTER WHEAT is named for its reddish color and for the Canadian farmer, Dave Fife, who commercialized it. Red Fife is known for its warm, nutty, sweet flavor. Although its exact origins are unknown, it likely came from Eastern Europe. It was introduced to Canada via the Fife farm in the 1840s. This all-around performer is good for pasta, bread, cookies, and cakes.

REDEEMER HARD RED WINTER WHEAT averages around 13% protein, has a mild flavor, and is stronger and absorbs more water than Warthog. It’s one of my favorite bread flours.

KANSAS TURKEY WHEAT was introduced to Kansas by Mennonites in 1874. I reach for this grain for its high protein and starch quality. Its flavor isn’t quite as remarkable as that of Red Fife. I use it for pasta and pizza doughs or in blends for pastry.

Soft White Wheat

This genre of wheats has a naturally white color and is perfect for delicate doughs, especially when it is finely milled. Frederick and Sonora are the soft white wheats that appear in this book. Some recipes simply list “soft white wheat flour” as an ingredient, but I always list my preferred flour alongside. In these cases, you can use the suggested wheat or any other from this category.

FREDERICK SOFT WHITE WHEAT makes a silky, white, and fluffy flour. It has low gluten potential and is ideal for flaky pastries.

SONORA SOFT WHITE WHEAT was first isolated in the mountain plains of Sonora, Mexico, in the early 1700s. Sonora thrives in arid desert climates like its native Mexico, Arizona, and California. It is very extensible, inexpensive, and absorbent, and has a subtle wheat flavor that’s never overwhelming. Low in both protein and gluten, it’s ideal for soft pastries and for blending with harder wheats that lack flavor or extensibility.

GLUTEN ISN’T EVIL

The grain market—like that of all industries—is shaped by trends and influenced by marketing. This weakness has been laid bare by the anti-gluten movement. Gluten is a protein that is produced when flour is mixed with water. It occurs in almost all grain-based bread, pizza, pasta, and pastry, although there are a small number of grains that don’t have any gluten potential at all, such as teff and buckwheat. Gluten itself is not naturally present in flour, but is activated by adding water, which creates the protein network.

Over the past decade, gluten has been demonized by the health food and diet industries. This anti-gluten movement is not related to the very serious celiac disease, an autoimmune illness present in around 1% of the population. People with celiac disease cannot consume gluten without serious adverse health effects. Yet more than one in three Americans has “taken a break” from gluten because of either a diagnosed or a perceived intolerance, neither of which is specifically the result of gluten itself but of reactions to commodity flour. Industrial flour is rife with compounds that could affect digestion and health. Meanwhile, the absence of bran and germ, the very substances that aid digestion and make flour “whole,” can turn the flour into an allergen of sorts.

Both scientific and anecdotal sources report that individuals with “gluten intolerance” can consume products made with whole grains, supporting the theory that gluten isn’t, in fact, evil. Commodity flour, on the other hand, may very well be.

Durum Wheat

Durum means “hard” in Latin, and durum wheats (Triticum durum) are related to historic grains like spelt (see this page). They have high gluten potential and generally are amber in color; purple-tinged Blue Beard is an exception. Durum is often used for pasta—its hardness contributes to an al dente texture. Durum gluten lacks elasticity, so the flour benefits from blending when making certain pasta shapes like orecchiette and cavatelli (this page). It breaks down quickly, so I avoid using it in high-hydration doughs such as ciabatta (this page). Blue Beard and Iraq durum are the two durum varieties used in this book’s recipes.

BLUE BEARD DURUM WHEAT (triticum turgidum), native to Iran, is named for the hue of its husk, which turns purplish-blue as it matures. It’s high in protein and low in gluten and has wonderful tropical fruit flavors, including banana. Blue Beard is ideal for slow-fermented breads, rustic baking, and pastas.

IRAQ DURUM WHEAT (triticum turgidum), originally from Iraq, was revived by Monica Spiller, founder of the Whole Grain Connection, a nonprofit organization that promotes whole grains. It is prized for the golden color and subtle sweetness it imparts to breads and pastas.

BUYING FRESHLY MILLED FLOUR AND WHEAT BERRIES FOR HOME MILLING

The recipes in this book were developed with and are meant to be made with freshly milled flour. The ideal is to use flour that has been milled immediately before you start in on a recipe. Obviously, this is easiest to do if you are milling at home, but you can also purchase freshly milled flour from millers (see this page), specialty shops, supermarkets, and farmers’ markets. You can purchase wheat berries for milling from the same sources.

For the best product, look for flour or wheat berries that are fresh and are the product of organic (or biodynamic) agriculture. But before you jump into buying anything, read up on wheat species (this page), understand the characteristics of each, then make your choices based on what you plan to cook—or choose what you want to cook based on the abilities of the wheat.

Buying Flour from a Mill

The mills I recommend are reputable, but if you purchase milled flour via mail order, you lose control over the temperature of the flour while it is in transit, which may accelerate its deterioration. Always refrigerate or freeze freshly milled flour—or at least keep it in a cool, dry place—in a sealed container.

Each miller will have their own specifications for how their operation runs. Some sell their own flour blends that they have developed for pastry, pizza, pasta, and bread, while others focus on varietal flours milled from specific wheats. Both the blends and the varietal flours are milled with the end use in mind. Flour for pastries is generally milled very fine, while you will encounter a whole range of coarseness for bread. The coarseness of the flour is sometimes indicated as “00” or “semolina”; both references come from Italian milling, but the United States lacks a defined system, so consult your miller for their precise specifications.

If you’re lucky enough to have an artisanal stone mill near you, the flour won’t have to travel very far, which is ideal for maintaining its integrity. When I buy flour from a miller, I always ask these questions:

• Where does the grain come from? For me, local is best.

• How was it grown? I recommend flour milled from wheat that was the product of organic or biodynamic agriculture.

• Who grew it? I want grain that was grown on a small farm by people who are paid a fair wage.

• How was the grain cleaned? As simply as possible, I hope.

• How was it stored? A cool, dry place is the only acceptable answer.

• How finely was the flour milled? I use this information to determine what recipe it might work for, and, based on the cues in this book, you can do the same.

Be sure to note the “milled on” date—most flours begin deteriorating two weeks after milling and retain their nutritional value and peak flavor only for that period. However, many vendors print a “use by” date extended up to two months. To maximize freshness and limit waste, order only the quantity of flour that you need.

Buying Wheat Berries from Farmers or Millers

Farmers, like chefs, are trying to run a tough, low-margin business. There are amazing farmers out there, but even some of my favorite farms with whom I have had long-established relationships have tried to unload a little second-rate stuff on me now and again. The same goes for millers, who often sell wheat berries in addition to freshly milled flour.

To be sure you are getting the best wheat berries possible, ask questions like those above in addition to:

• How was the grain dried? I make the purchase only if the response is “slowly and at a low temperature.”

• When was the grain harvested? I want a product that was harvested within a year at the most.

• Do you know any bakers who have worked with these grains? What kinds of recipes have they had success with? I often get inspired by how others have used the grains I’m buying.

• Was the wheat tested for bacteria and fungus? Hopefully it was and came back clean! I always check to see if any of the wheat is pink—if so, then it is infected with an undesirable fungus. Smell and taste the grain. It should have a wheaty aroma and taste good. If it smells like cinnamon, that signals a fungus problem. And if it tastes bad, it probably won’t make very delicious bread, pizza, pasta, or pastry.

Buying Flour and Wheat Berries from a Supermarket

On supermarket shelves you will find packages that are labeled simply “Hard Winter Wheat Flour” or “Wheat Berries.” In these cases, you won’t be able to precisely predict the product’s characteristics or capacities and you will have to use trial and error to test its strengths and weaknesses.

In regions of the United States where there are robust grain cultures and vibrant milling movements, the stores are more advanced when it comes to labeling, the variety of grains offered, and the attention to provenance. Upstate New York is at the helm, and Wegmans supermarket chain has even built a mill in its Rochester flagship. Whole Foods locations across the Northeast source flour from small stone mills, but the bags can be twice as expensive as purchasing directly from the mill of origin. Organic whole food stores typically sell a range of wheat berries and stone-milled flours, though labeling specificity varies.

KEEPING WHEAT BERRIES AND FLOUR FRESH

Properly dried wheat berries are shelf stable and keep well in an airtight container in a cool, dry place for years. Freshly milled flour, on the other hand, is much more perishable. As soon as the grain is milled, its interior structure is exposed to oxygen and begins to deteriorate. Keep flour in a sealed container, ideally in your refrigerator or freezer. Label your flour with the “milled on” date and, if possible, use it within two weeks of milling.