I know, I know. You all want me to tell you all about Italy. But between the jet lag and the need to return to real life I haven’t even had time to look at the photos, much less start to write about the experience. And tonight I’m off to a going away party for my good friend Shannon (she and her hubby are moving to London) so it won’t be happening then either. So, please be patient, I really can’t wait to talk about it – just not yet.
What I can wrap my head around is two new great local sources that I found. We’re participating in the Local Thanksgiving Challenge this year. My mother-in-law is gracious enough to host and to let me change the game for the year. I’ve found most everything we need, short a turkey as I keep finding them but no one will confirm that I’ve got one, so right now our bird is coming from California.
But what we were lacking was a local source for flour for pies, breads, etc. There’s a lot of wheat grown in Washington, but mostly the soft white that is made into cake flour, not the hard red that is used for most other types of baking. And even the soft white is hard to find as most of it is exported out of the state / country. Imagine my delight when I found Bluebird Grain Farms out of Winthrop, Washington. They grow hard red wheat, soft white wheat, Emmer and Rye in the Upper Methow Valley and mill it themselves. While they’re still 250+ miles away, it’s a heck of a lot closer than Montana.
I’ve ordered a selection of both red and white wheat flour, rye flour and their old world cereal mix. I can’t wait for it to arrive to give it a try. Now we’ve sourced most everything we need, excepting things like sugar, oils and the dratted bird of course. Too bad I can’t talk anyone into cooking a goose instead…
Thanks to Saara, I also just discovered the Starving Farmer Popcorn Co out of Quincy, WA (just over 150 miles away). He grows only Japanese White Hulless Popcorn in 2 lb. bags. Saara swears that it pops up nice and light. Since he also includes instructions for popping it in the microwave, he’s probably my new hero. I love popcorn, but the microwaveable bags give me the heebie-jeebies. And we don’t own an air popper. Yay for caramel and cheese corn this winter. I ordered 8 bags since the shipping cost was the same as one. So if you’re on my Christmas list, act surprised when you get your bag of kernels.
Don’t forget Fairhaven Mills out of Bellingham! Their whole wheat pastry flour is made of Grown in Washington wheat. That’s the softer low gluten stuff, of course, which is great for pies. I bought 5# of Bluebird’s emmer when I was in Twisp. Maybe tomorrow I should grind some and see how it does for bread! :)
I think our turkey is coming from CA too.
Yeah, I thought about ordering from Fairhaven Mills too, but I couldn’t find anywhere local to pick it up. I only wanted to pay shipping once, and since Bluebird’s red wheat was WA grown too I went with them. Have to pick up some Fairhaven’s next time I’m up your direction.
Stone Buhr also makes a Washington grown all-purpose flour, which is available at Top Foods in our area, or Amazon carries it.
I have yet to order a turkey. It’ll probably be a CA bird as well. I’d better get on it!
What an interesting dilemma! Out here in CT, there are several farms to get heritage turkeys, but nowhere to get wheat (and most other grains).