About A micro-bakery in Duluth, MN focused on organic, naturally leavened breads and other baked goods. Weekly pre-orders are available. Head to our home page to see the next pre-order date or our offerings page to see if anything is available to order! We bake out of Spirit of the Lake Community Arts building in the Lakeside neighborhood of Duluth. Follow us on Instagram to see what we’re up to! Instagram Some other helpful info, if you’re curious… Where is our flour from? Our flour is currently all from Meadowlark Farm and Mill. They grow and mill their own organic grain as well as organic grain from other regionally local farmers in MN, WI, MI, IA, and OH. They are focused on regenerative agricultural practices and producing nutritious and flavorful stone-ground flours. Check out their grain guide to learn more! We might also source flour from Bakersfield Flour and Bread, another mill that uses locally grown grain in their stone-milling process. What kinds of flours do we use?Currently, we use different varieties of modern wheat, spelt, rye, and buckwheat flours as well as oats, polenta, and other whole grains and seeds. What’s different about our flour? What is whole-grain flour and what is bolted/high-extraction flour?All of our flour is stone ground, which helps to preserve flavor and extra nutrients. We purchase both whole grain and bolted, or high-extraction, flours. Whole grain means that all of the grain parts are present in the flour. The bran, germ, and endosperm all end up in the flour. The bran is the harder outer coating that protects the inner seed. The germ, which ends up being the embryo if the seed is allowed to grow, is a nutrient and fat dense part of the wheat seed. The endosperm contains extra nutrients for the embryo for the seed growing process. White flour normally only contains the endosperm. By removing the bran and germ, the flour becomes more shelf stable, but loses a lot of nutrients and fats! Bolted, or high-extraction flour contains the endosperm and the germ, with most of the bran being sifted out. This allows for a nutrient dense loaf of bread while retaining some of the lightness that comes from using only white flour. We normally aim for around 50% of our flour to be whole grain in our bread dough. Anyone can taste the difference between a loaf of bread made with white flour and one that is made with a mixture of stoneground bolted and whole grain flours. We know that you want to try for yourself! Is sourdough really healthier for you? Well, it depends on who you ask, but we can tell you it is a healthier option than any conventional bread you can find in the grocery store. Everyones body and digestive system is different, and there are many people who report less sensitivities after eating sourdough bread compared to conventional bread. That’s because our sourdough bread is fermented, which means that the grains are already partially digested by all of those wonderful wild yeasts. Also, we use all of that nutrient dense flour that we wrote about above! All of our bread is made with a dough starter, which consists of a bit of our starter (flour and water that we continuously refresh and feed), water, and certain flours and grains, depending on the type of bread we are making. This is what we end up calling pre-fermented flour, which normally accounts for 15-25% of the total flour in our bread. This sits out for 12-16 hours at room temperature, becoming bubbly and active, allowing for a vivacious dough starter to be added to our bread dough to push along all of the necessary fermentation before the bread goes into the oven. So, is it healthy? Yes, for the reasons described above, and no…it is still bread, but we love bread! And we want to eat bread that makes us smile and feels good in our bodies, and that’s what we create.
