An Old-World Flour Milling Tradition: Days 56 and 57

If there’s one thing I love more than bread, it’s a good bread origin story. Knowing the backstory and passion behind the loaves and baker really does make you appreciate the bread all the more.

Bob’s Red Mill traditional and dedicated take on flour has been a long time in the making. Back in the 1960s, Bob Moore read a book about an old stone-grinding flour mill. The book sparked an idea to use this old-time practice to create a healthy and nutritious product. His family was already focused on eating wholesome natural foods.

So why not share that with families everywhere?

So Bob and his wife Charlee started tracking down their own millstones and soon opened a mill in Redding, California. By the late ’70s, the couple were ready for retirement, so they left sunny Cal for Oregon City. But Bob couldn’t move on from milling just yet. He found an old mill for sale, and soon Bob’s Red Mill reopened in Oregon.

A few years later, tragedy struck. An arsonist started a fire that destroyed the mill. Still, Bob preserved and built his stone-grinding flour mill from the ground up once again. It is still grinding out flour today, stronger than ever!

Through the years, the company has stayed true to Bob’s original vision of using Old World technology to make a nutritional, healthy flour.

The quartz millstones are similar to early Roman mills. The speed and temperature help preserve the goodness inside whole grains, resulting in a flour that you can just taste the freshness!

Today, Bob’s Red Mill sells flours and meals, cereals, granola, mixes, oats, grains, beans, seeds and nutritional boosters at their Oregon location and their online store. The company is now employee owned. As Bob put it, “It was just the right thing to do. I have people that have worked with me for over 30 years and each and every one of them deserve this.”

I love stories like these. As I munch on their 10 grain bread, I feel honored to be in Oregon and eating bread from Bob’s Red Mill.

Hearty stoneground 10 grain bread.

Here’s what I ate on Days 56 and 57 of EB90: