Devin Jamroz knows there is something special about the white wheat variety known as India Jammu that is grown in Colorado.
The CEO of the company Dry Storage in Boulder said the grain made its way to the front range after being pulled from a seed vault in 2020 and passed into the hands of local baker Andy Clark at Moxie Bread Co. in Louisville.
Clark milled some but got so excited over the bread it produced that he handed it off to the MASA Seed Foundation in Boulder where it wound up with several local farmers and eventually to Dry Storage as they were putting together their inventory of local grains.
"We launched it (Indian Jammu) a month ago and we"re getting it into more chefs and baker"s hands to play with," Jamoz said. "It could potentially change the game and change the narrative around the usability of single-varietal, stone-milled flours because it is just so easy to use."
While Colorado is known to grow high-protein winter wheat due to the temperature fluctuation and a relatively short growing season, Jamroz said more than 80% of the wheat grown in the state is shipped elsewhere.
Local grains can be expensive compared to commodity flour and more challenging to work with due to their unique characteristics, but the appeal of local sourcing along with heightened nutrition and taste has been bringing regional flour back to Denver"s food scene.
Launched with a mission of bringing local grains back into the supply chain, James Beard Award-nominated chef Kelly Whitaker and Id Est Hospitality founded Dry Storage in 2019 to create a product they were struggling to find in the local market.
Following a successful trial with six local farms in the San Luis Valley, Dry Storage has partnered with local farms using regenerative and organic practices, milling their wheat and distributing the four to a growing number of regional partners, along with operating a cafe, grain mill and bakery based in Boulder.
Similarly to many mass-produced staples such as coffee, modern mills can produce large quantities of commodity flour with a consistent flavor profile, enabling identical products to be created anywhere. Stone mills like the one used by Dry Storage don"t strip away as many nutrients, maintaining the grain"s unique flavor profile.
"There"s an undeniable taste of Colorado," Jamroz said. "You can tell the difference between wheat that"s been grown here and grown elsewhere."
Rebel Bread on South Broadway has had the unique experience of transitioning its beloved neighborhood baked goods to new recipes derived entirely from local grains. Since beginning to work with Dry Storage in 2023, the small-batch, artisan bakery initially introduced the Sonoran sandwich loaf from a variety of Colorado rye flour and has incorporated it into their popular favorites such as the charcuterie sourdough, kimchi squash and cheddar sourdough and The Nonna G sourdough.
"After operating the bakery for a few years, we learned how important flour sourcing could be, both for the nutrition of the product as well as for the role that we then play in local economies and sustainable agriculture," said Zach Martinucci, founder and baker at Rebel Bread.
As a baker, Martinucci said working with a single variety of flour produced from a local mill makes for a more intentional process all around as the bakery has to pay closer attention to the nuances in the flour.
"We have to pay attention to hydration, the amount of water we"re adding, and our fermentation reactions are more active. They happen more quickly," Martinucci said. "The depth of flavor is incredible and the product tastes fresher. It tastes like we baked it earlier."
Perfecting the new recipe was an undertaking as Rebel Bread sought to come up with a finished product that tasted the same if not better than their original loaves. Despite the challenge a transition to local grains can present for existing businesses, Martinucci said he"s been excited to see more businesses in the Denver metro area like Odell"s Bagels embracing local grains from day one.
Serving Denver"s Highlands neighborhood out of the old Denver Bread Company building on Irving Street, Odell"s Bagel has embraced the use of locally sourced grains along with other ingredients since opening its doors in October.
"I have always strived to use local ingredients and when we opened this place, that was not going to change," chef Miles Odell said. "It"s nice to know where our grains are coming from and that our farmers are being supported. It"s a small ecosystem that is sustainable."
Since launching the bagel shop, Odell"s has been whipping up an assortment of hand-rolled and naturally fermented bagels. Along with the use of local grains, the shop focuses on incorporating as many locally sourced ingredients as possible such as seasonal jams, currently offering a plum jam and will soon be moving into marmalades for the winter citrus season.
The use of local grains not only aligned with Odell"s philosophy as a chef, but he said it enabled the shop to deliver a delicious locally derived product with a unique taste.
"It"s impossible to replicate the flavor we"re going after if we"re not using these gains," Odell said. "This is not an East Coast bagel. We made the recipe and we baked them here. It"s a Denver-style bagel."
The enthusiasm for a more local taste has been working its way onto the heart of Denver, fueling the over 100 restaurants including six Michelin Star restaurants that use Dry Storage"s grain along with bakeries, pizza shops, breweries and distilleries.
New Image Brewing in Arvada is currently experimenting with local wheat for their core beer recipes while a scratch kitchen at the Empower Field is cheffing up pancakes sourced from local wheats for the Denver Broncos.
Because locally sourced wheat can come at a higher price than commodity flour, Jamroz said accessibility is an integral aspect of their operations. They are currently working on a pilot program with the Cherry Creek School District to provide a monthly cinnamon roll breakfast with whole wheat flour made especially for the schools, receiving positive feedback from students.
With more businesses experimenting with local wheat, this year the mill saw its first renovations since opening, but Jamroz said moving forward Dry Storage will have to be creative about how they scale to stay true to their local-focused mission.
He emphasized that Dry Storage"s mission statement of "grain is our medium for change" is much bigger than the mill"s operations in Colorado but indicative of an alternative method of food production that values local products and producers.
"The idea would be to start opening new facilities in different regions that are big enough to produce a competitively priced flour but each being region specific and working with a network of local farmers," Jamroz said. "We"re leaning into local grain economies and the unique wheat that can be grown in different places around the country."
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