For the love of local carbs: Bakeries using Skagit-milled flour

Skagit Valley has always been a great place to walk the walk when it comes to eating locally, but now it’s even possible to get bread made with local flour.

That’s thanks to the work of Stephen Jones and his research teams at the WSU Breadlab, who have been working for years on the development of new wheat varieties for Western Washington, and Cairnspring Mills, founded in 2016 as a way of bringing the Breadlab’s work to fruition by milling and distributing locally grown grains.

Now, multiple bakeries in our region make good use of local ingredients, from the flour to the sweetener. Many of these are small subscription or pop-up bakeries like Sly & Son, Fir Island Cakery, GIRLnDOG and Dough’s Bakery, but it also includes Bellingham standbys Mount Bakery and Avenue Bread, plus several other bakeries dedicated to the use of local ingredients.

Raven Bakery, which opened exactly one year ago, is one of the newest additions to the local bakery scene. They have the distinction of making all of their local bread deliveries by bicycle, even in terrible weather. Their whole grain breads and pastries are made from ingredients sourced as locally as possible, including eggs, nuts, honey and produce from local farms, and flour from Cairnspring Mills, Fairhaven Mills, and Camas Country Mill in Oregon.

While their superb rye bread might be one of their biggest draws, Raven’s whole wheat sandwich bread is toasty and sour, with a fresh homemade flavor. I once had the best gingersnap of my life there, soft and chewy and studded with spicy bits of crystallized ginger.

To celebrate their one-year anniversary on Saturday, March 16, Raven Bakery is offering free birthday cake and a raffle (with a first prize of a loaf of bread every week for a year) and for the month of March, they are donating $1 for every loaf of bread sold to World Central Kitchen.

Down at the Port of Skagit outside of Burlington, Water Tank Bakery is right next door to Cairnspring Mills. Owner Rachael Sobczak worked at the Breadfarm for 10 years, then pursued a new career path as a dietician. When the pandemic hit she started her own subscription baking service with pop-ups in various locations, then in 2021 she was able to open a permanent location on Water Tank Road (hence the name) with a service window for those of us who like to swing by while walking our dogs at the Port trails.

Water Tank makes a roasted onion bread which is absolutely divine, and I always keep a container of her oat shortbreads on hand for emergencies. Even better, a full selection of her bread is now available at the Skagit Valley Food Co-op.

Which brings us to the Breadfarm, a destination for bread lovers for more than 20 years. Since the pandemic, their little storefront in downtown Edison is no longer open inside for visitors, but they’ve created a handy pair of windows on the side of the building for ordering and pickup. If you have your eye on something particularly popular (like their crunchy, buttery kouign-amann), but worry that it will be sold out by the time you get there, you can order online as early as 7 a.m. for pickup any time that day.

Breadfarm makes a variety of cookies, crackers and pastries, but I can never visit the bakery without getting a little bag of freshly baked coconut macaroons. They make a wide range of breads, including baguettes and their Monster sandwich loaves. I’ve been addicted to their Samish River potato bread for years (seriously, a loaf of this and some soft butter is a terrible temptation to have in the house).

While Breadfarm bread is not made with 100% local grain, they have been incorporating local flours for a long time. In their early years, they used flour from Fairhaven Mill made from Expresso wheat from a farm in Lynden, then they helped Jones trial some of his wheat varieties for baking. When Cairnspring finally opened, the Breadfarm was one of their first customers.

“One of the challenges to using local grains has been to gain access to them. Cairnspring opened that door in a big way,” Breadfarm owner Scott Mangold said.

Breadfarm currently uses about 25% Cairnspring’s Trailblazer flour, much of which comes from grain grown in the Skagit Valley, and recently they’ve started dabbling with Chimacum Valley Grainery flours, milled with grains grown near Port Townsend.  

“It becomes a question of getting the right grains that have inherently good baking qualities and will grow well in our climate,” Mangold said.

Because local grains tend to come from many different fields, and growing conditions vary from year to year, there is performance variability in the flour. 

“We simply embrace that,” Mangold said. They either create a new product to feature that specific flour, or they adjust their process to accommodate. “There’s no question it’s extra work but it’s exciting, interesting and grows us as bakers in our craft.”

Jessamyn Tuttle is a freelance writer and photographer based in the Skagit Valley.