Grind wheat to make Bread

Benefits

Environmental Benefit: ★★☆☆☆
You save a little on packaging by baking your own bread and grinding your own flour. Especially if you reuse breadbags to hold your bread!

Money Saved: ★★★☆☆
Storebought bread is pretty expensive these days. And it's mostly air anyway! (Didn't you ever wad up a slice into a little ball as a kid?)

Lifestyle Benefit: ★★☆☆☆
Although kids sometimes prefer the light airy fluffiness of storebought bread, they can also come to appreciate the yumminess of fresh-baked wheat bread. Especially lightly toasted with butter and fresh strawberry jam. There isn't much better than that! Only downside is the extra work to make the bread - but if you make several loafs at a time (or use a bread machine if you must!) it doesn't have to take too much effort.

What We’re Doing
On sunny days Shannon often bakes bread in our solar oven outdoors. In the winter though, sometimes she'll just go ahead and use the oven since it helps warm up the house anyways. We did a lot of research a number of years back and purchased a Country Living Grain Mill. It uses a steel grinder that works faster for hand-grinding than a stone wheel. We wanted a mill that could be used by hand, for emergency use. But after grinding our first batch of wheat that way, we elected to motorize it for daily use! This mill has a wheel that can handle a belt, making it easy to hook up to a motor (see photo). I just got a grinding wheel pully and a 1/2 hp motor, mounting them all on a thick board. If we needed to, we could hook the handle up again and do it using "muscle power". They also had a photo on their website of someone who had hooked a stationary bicycle up to one! We've been grinding wheat for all our bread for at least 6 years now on it with no problems - it's very solidly made. In fact, Shannon has become the "miller girl" for our neighborhood - also grinding wheat for other ladies nearby!

A Little Humor
The children were lined up in the cafeteria of a Catholic elementary school for lunch. At the head of the table was a large tray of bread slices. The nun posted a sign on the bread tray, "Take only one. God is watching."Further along the lunch line, at the other end of the table was a large pile of chocolate chip cookies. One child whispered to another, "Take all you want. God is watching the bread."