Baking with Buckwheat: A Virtual Workshop
Date: October 3rd, 2020
Time: 11am-1pm EST
Cost: $40
Bakers are welcome to join Fr. Paul and Ora Breads student intern, Meg Gombojav as we incorporate buckwheat into baking. Buckwheat plays an integral role in a renewed grain economy—even though buckwheat itself is not a grain–both in the field and in the bread. Botanically speaking buckwheat is a pseudo-cereal and so not a grass/grain. The mature buckwheat seed from this broad leafed plant are milled to produce a gluten-free flour.
Many places enjoy the common Japanese variety of buckwheat yielding a brownish grey flour with earthly flavors. Maine—and the northern valley of Aroostook County—are uniquely situated to cultivate and consume a little know variety of buckwheat known as tartary buckwheat. This heritage variety of buckwheat yields a mature seed featuring characteristics of ancient grain and yields a flour that is greenish-yellow in hue.
Join us as we display the unique characteristics of buckwheat varieties and demonstrate how to incorporate buckwheat flour, groats, kasha and flakes into a base sourdough bread formula. Lets celebrate buckwheat!
About Fr. Paul:
Originally from Madawaska, Maine, Fr. Paul Dumais is a Catholic priest of the Diocese of Portland currently serving as the pastor of St. Joseph, Farmington and St. Rose of Lima, Jay where he resides. During a hiatus from college Dumais was introduced to the wonder of good bread as real food when working on a Kansas wheat farm. The love of all things bread has made him a regular at the Kneading Conference. Since presenting at the KC 2014 when Fr. Paul reintroduced a naturally leavened ploye like his great grandmother would have made, his adventures in ploye making have been chronicled in the Sun Journal, the Portland Press Herald, Catholic Rural Life, Saveur online and most recently in Breadlines, the journal of the Bread Baker’s Guild of America. These days he is baking with friends and volunteers at Ora Breads—a bread guild providing bread to the community as they collaborate to feed the hungry in Franklin County.
Moderator: Tristan Noyes
Raised by a farming family in northern Maine, Tristan developed an early passion for supporting agricultural communities. While a student, Tristan’s interest in organic practices led to him co-founding the Bowdoin Organic Garden. After a short spell hiking a section of the Appalachian Trail, he settled in Boston and built a career in global education. Tristan’s love for education took him around the world and ultimately back to Maine, where he and his brother started Gromaine Organic Farm. Tristan soon sought knowledge about growing local grains. Inspired by meeting the incredible members of the Maine Grain Alliance, Tristan joined the organization as its Executive Director in 2016.