Melgard Farms — Stone-Milled Flour

Flour from one farm, start to finish. Grown without chemicals, stone-milled fresh, never bleached or enriched.

Melgard Farms grows the wheat, mills it on site between two stones, and bags it. Stone milling keeps the germ and the bran oils in the flour instead of stripping them out, which is why this flour smells like wheat and why it does not sit on a shelf for a year. The farm works regeneratively: cover crops, compost, beneficial insects instead of insecticides, no herbicides.

Fresh flour behaves differently from commodity flour. It drinks about 10% more water and ferments faster, so give your dough a little more liquid and watch it rather than the clock.

Who this is for

• Sourdough bakers who want flour with something alive in it
• You want to know where your wheat was grown, and by whom
• Anyone avoiding bleached, bromated or enriched flour
• Families who bake weekly and go through a bag

Varieties

• Bread, 5 lb: higher protein for loaves, pizza and bagels
• Whole Wheat Pastry, 5 lb: soft wheat for muffins, cookies, pie crust and pancakes
• All-Purpose, 4 lb: the everyday bag
• Whole Grain Rye, 4 lb: for rye loaves and adding depth to sourdough

Keep it cool and use within three to four months, or freeze it. Melgard Farms is a family farm and mill run by Kris, a second-generation farmer, and Emily, a former bakery hand.