Time Marches on....

I didn't realize it has been such a long time since I've done a post!  My apology!!

This past weekend Alicia and I drove to Olympia to attend the Cascadia Grains Conference.  This is a group of people that are trying to revitalize the grain industry in Western Washington.  They are kind enough to include Eastern Washington as well!  The focus of the conference is to bring together growers, bakers, brewers and end users.  The emphasis so far, has been on small producers, niche markets, heritage grains, mircro brewers and bakers, millers etc.

It was all stimulating information and we met interesting people that were presenting some thought provoking ideas.  We're not sure how any of what we learned can or will translate to our business, but we were happy to have spent time learning.

Friday afternoon we both took a cooking class taught by Courtney who has a micro bakery in Portland called Wyld Breads.  She uses whole grains and natural levins exclusively.  She taught us to make sourdough English muffins (amazing) and salted chocolate chunk cookies (double amazing!).

Folks gathered for the baking class Friday afternoon.

Kneading the sourdough English muffin dough.

My favorite baker in the class!

English muffins cooking on the griddle.

Finished muffins.  We added rosemary and cheddar cheese to our dough.  

Salted Chocolate Chunk Cookies.  We each got to eat one.  The rest we had to save for the conference lunch the next day.

The conference was held at South Puget Sound Community College.  Lunch and dinner were served by students in the culinary arts program, focusing on whole grains and locally produced vegetables.

One seminar on Saturday tasting beer made with two different varieties of malting barley.  There was a distinct difference in taste, though I didn't like one better than the other.  They were just different.

Close up of the beer.  You might be able to see that the glass on the left is slightly more cloudy than the one on the right.  

Dinner Saturday night featured two different conference attendees food.  Flour tortillas, chips and salsa from one business and the other provided corn tortillas.  All products were made from heritage grains.  

Best conference take away was this nifty tote bag!