I have made whole wheat bread for the past 36 years — all of my married life. Before that I made white bread or a blend of wheat and white. When we first got married, we had a place where we could go to get our red wheat ground, and I mixed bread by hand. Somehow we managed to eat the bread I made as I learned how to make 100% whole wheat bread before the advent of white wheat. Since we didn’t have our own grain mill, we would get about 25 lbs. of wheat ground at a time for the convenience. We made an interesting discovery: The bread we made from the freshly ground wheat tasted really wonderful, but each successive batch of bread was a little less tasty as the flour lost its freshness. We bought a recipe book, Wheat For Man, by Rosenvall, Miller and Flack, which gave us this information: “only freshly ground whole wheat flour insures full flavor and maximum nutrition.”

After about four years, even though we were still struggling financially, we decided to make a grain mill a high priority on our needs list and started looking for one. We opted to buy one that would grind any grain or nut or seed — even make peanut butter. We’re still using that same mill after 32 years, although the power switch has had to be replaced a couple of times. It has been a very wise investment, and I would encourage any serious wheat bread bakers to invest in their own grain mill.