GrainsWest Summer 2018

The Food Issue 2018 Grains West 30 FEATURE Among her students, she said many want to reconnect with bread precisely because of the family and community stories and experiences they associate with it. A graduate of Ballymaloe Cookery School, located on an idyllic farm near the village of Shanagarry in Ireland’s County Cork, Whittaker’s own bread story started in sourdough baking sessions with classmates. “We’d get together in the evenings, have a bottle of wine and some cheese,” she recalled. “Someone would have baked a fresh loaf of bread, and we’d all be at various stages of our next loaf. We’d sit and reflect and talk. It was as much about the social experience as it was about the bread. I fell in love with bread.” Returning to Canada, she spent six months perfecting her sourdough skills, preparing an extensive recipe pack for her very sociable cooking and baking classes, which she launched in November of 2015. She has also made connections with local farmers who now supply most of her ingredients, including flour she purchases from Highwood Crossing Foods in High River and Gold Forest Grains just northwest of Edmonton. Whittaker said home bakers are likewise searching out local flour for their baking, posting photos and discussing their results on social media. Of the people who take her all-day sourdough workshops, Whittaker estimates over half become hooked and go on to bake bread regularly. “It’s really hot right now. Opening that oven and seeing that fresh bread never gets old.” FLOUR POWER Tony and Penny Marshall own and operate Highwood Crossing Farm, an organic grain operation that’s been in Tony’s family for 125 years. They also operate Highwood Crossing Foods, which makes organic food products. Established in 1996, it has supplied flax and canola oils, granola as well as other cereal products and flour to restaurants, grocers and bakeries. The bulk of the flour is milled by contractors and sold wholesale to commercial bakers, while it is also purchased for retail sale by Safeway, Sobeys, Federated Co-operatives, Community Natural Foods and Sunterra Market. Consumers can buy flour from Highwood in bulk but, more typically, they purchase the company’s two-, 10- and 20-kilogrambags from food retailers. Tony saidmost Highwood Crossing flour is destined for breadmaking. Echoing the use of local barley in Bread-baking classes With renewed consumer interest in bread, baking courses are in demand and book up quickly. Here are a few home-baking classes offered across the province. The Ruby Apron Visit therubyapron.ca to sign up for Edmonton chef Kaelin Whittaker’s cooking and baking classes. Held at her home baking studio, these include evening and full-day sourdough workshops as well as two-day dough- making classes. SAIT Continuing-education baking courses are available at the SAIT main campus and SAIT Culinary Campus on Stephen Avenue Walk. To register for five-hour, artisan bread courses held on Saturdays, click on the culinarycampus.ca “classes” menu. NAIT The artisan bread-baking courses available to the public at Edmonton’s NAIT campus include 12 hours of instruction offered on either evenings or weekends. Aimed at home bakers as well as professionals, the first-level course teaches European-style sourdough baking methods. The second-level course expands on the basics, emphasizing creativity and invention. Visit the “hospitality and culinary” menu at nait.ca/programsandcourses for information and to register. The Cookbook Co. Cooks Baker Aviv Fried of Sidewalk Citizen Bakery conducts sourdough bread classes at The Cookbook Co. Cooks, a culinary store located in Calgary’s Design District. These one-off evening classes include two glasses of wine selected by Metrovino wine shop. For class information and to register, visit eventbrite.ca. As consumers are embracing whole-grain and sourdough breads, home-baking courses are in high demand.