Flathead Bread focuses on home-baked artisan loaves

After many years of dealing with an intolerance to store-bought bread, Wendy Hall was encouraged by a friend to start making her own. Eventually, Hall started Flathead Bread as a way to help others enjoy her artisan loaves and pastries.

“Some years ago, a friend of ours who is a James Beard Award winning baker opened a shop a mile from our house in Tucson. We would walk there to get bread and it didn’t bother me or hurt my stomach,” Hall said. “So we started buying from him and he encouraged me to take a class from him where I got some of the knowledge that I needed.”

Hall explained that the James Beard Award is a high honor within the culinary world to recognize chefs, bakers, restaurateurs, and journalists. Hall continually improves her skills by taking classes and is a graduate of the San Francisco Baking Institute. She eventually hopes to attend Le Cordon Bleu, an international network of prestigious culinary schools teaching French haute cuisine.

“Last year, we converted our basement into a bakery and now we have a proofing room, a chilling room, we got an industrial mixer, and we got a bread oven from the United Kingdom,” said Hall. “I had been baking for years for family and friends, but this was the first time I had done anything for sales and we just dove in full force.”

While Flathead Bread does not have a storefront, Hall and her partner, Tim Crist, currently attend the Whitefish and Kalispell farmers markets. Hall is committed to baking healthy and organic bread and uses local ingredients whenever possible.

“I thought, ‘We can’t find bread like we want here, so we’ll bring it to the community.’ Our goal is to have more nutritional bread. We only use organic flours in our breads with water and salt, and there are no added chemicals,” she said.

After much research, Hall decided to use flour from Wheat Montana and Cairnspring Mills. She also mills her own whole wheat from organically grown wheat berries.

“Commercially, all the germ and the brand is stripped out, and they'll bleach it,” said Hall. “We’re kind of going back in time because this is how they made bread back in the ancient days. I buy 50 pound bags of wheat berries and grind them myself and I don’t sift anything out. I keep all the nutrients in there.”

Since the start of Hall’s bread-making journey, she has felt most rewarded by becoming a part of the community and helping others who otherwise might not be able to enjoy bread. Flathead Bread also donates bread to the Creston volunteer fire department and nonprofits like the Mountain Brook Homestead Community and the Flathead Valley Food Bank.

A time-intensive endeavor, bread-baking takes several days and Hall has a hard time keeping up with the demand.

“At the Whitefish farmers market, we sometimes sell out within an hour. We can only make so much. My chiller is only so big and I only have so many hours,” said Hall.

Flathead Bread provides bread to restaurants like the Firebrand, the Markus Community Market, and other food trucks and caterers. A huge variety of loaves are available including seeded, cheddar jalapeno, garlic asiago, and rosemary and garlic. Flathead Bread also offers cowboy cookies, pain au chocolat, croissants, and Koigann-Aman pastries.

Hall is always experimenting with new flavors and techniques and hopes to expand her reach with a commercial kitchen.

“We would like to add a commercial kitchen which would give us an opportunity to bake more and deliver. It would be so cool to have some chairs around for people to come and hang out or have a cup of coffee and pastry in the morning,” she said. “Our main focus is bringing healthier foods to the community.”

Flathead Bread participates in the Kalispell and Whitefish farmers markets during the summer and takes a hiatus during the winter. To learn more, visit flatheadbread.com. They can also be reached by phone 406-499-9595 or email wendy@flatheadbread.com.

Reporter Summer Zalesky may be reached at szalesky@dailyinterlake.com.