New York Magazine Declares the Moment in Local Flour

January 10, 2012
Posted in Greenmarket | Tagged Grains

Bread Last month, New York magazine's 'Reasons to Love New York' issue featured a 14-page spread on this 'local-floured moment in dough', an homage to the artisanal loaves that are being baked in the city's top ovens. Greenmarket’s efforts to encourage more regional growers to start planting grain began back in 2004, when Greenmarket began to assess how and where its bakers could source local flour. Thanks to those early efforts, chefs and bakers have embraced these less familiar grains incorporating them into seasonal dishes on their menus, and even hiring bakers and building bread ovens for their restaurants (Roman's and Roberta's, both in Brooklyn, are two examples). The article's 'Bread (Time) Line', notes 2009’s introduction of Cayuga Pure Organics’ locally grown and milled flour to Greenmarket as one of the most recent milestones in a great history. No less than 6 of the 13 bakers mentioned in New York’s round-up of the baker's dozen best attended the landmark tasting of local grains held by Greenmarket and the Northeast Organic Farmers Association (NOFA) nearly two Januarys ago at the French Culinary Institute (covered here by Edible Manhattan). This event helped lay the groundwork for New York’s local grains revolution. And since that tasting, three more bakers that made NY mag's list have become involved with Greenmarket's Farm to Bakery pilot, a program which connects bakers directly to regional grain growers. Due to the increasing demand in the city marketplace, Greenmarket's grain farmers are expanding their businesses and encouraging the development of infrastructure like mills and malting facilities. And outside the city, on a regional scale, Greenmarket's work to publicize these farmers, help build demand, and educate shoppers on the varieties of grains that grow well in the Northeast has rippled out to fields in Massachusetts, Vermont and Maine, where yet more growers and bakers are embracing this wave of heritage grain. Check out a list of where and when to buy local grain and flour at Greenmarket, as well as a list of Greenmarket grain-forward recipes to expand your baking repertoire.

Recent Posts

Programs

Tags

More tags

Archives