Bob's Red Mill Field Trip

Yesterday I received a phone call from a friend saying that Bob's Red Mill had opened a new manufacturing Facility and they were having a grand opening today, with a pancake breakfast, tour of the facility etc.. sooooo today we took a field trip to Bob's Red Mill. If you haven't heard about Bob's Red Mill products, they are all whole grain and good for ya! They even have quite a bit of gluten free products. I haven't really used any of their stuff. I think once I bought some type of flour or something or other. I plan on picking up stuff more often. I did find that some of the products I buy in bulk at Winco are from them. So that's good. The story behind the company is neat. Check out the website from the link above. So anyways.....Holy cow! When we arrived, it was packed already and we got there about 15 minutes after it opened. I guess when you say Pancake Breakfast that really draws people. My girls said "uh, mom, so far we're the oldest "kids" here". Most of the people were older, but did see a few older kids as we moved around. The people at the company said they didn't think there'd be this many people. The pancakes were great. Even Nan liked them and she's picky.

It was a great free meal. Pancakes (2 each), and OJ. They had cooking demo's and we got to sample some of their steel cut oatmeal, which they had flavored with maple syrup. Yum-O. Even Nan liked this and she hates oatmeal. They do cooking classes at their store. That would be fun to go to.

Getting ready for the tour. Stylin huh? Good thing I had the camera...I don't even want to know what I looked like.

We even got a shot with "Bob" and his wife "Charlee" before going on our tour. He is 79 years old and is pretty "young" and still very active and involved in the company. The story is pretty amazing.

Hey, they even Ship to South Korea. All of their product in their distribution center is pre-ordered. They don't mass produce and then let it sit on shelves for months.

Some of their packing equipment.

This is a smaller version of a grain mill. They sell these to places like Great Harvest Bread Company.

The big bag on top is the grain. It goes down a shoot into the mill, is ground by the stones then is sent up to a cyclone which has a screen in it that helps create the "fineness" of the flour. They can change screens depending on the texture they want. Way cool. So they still use the stones to grind the grains.

A mill stone!

Nan and a friend checking out the grain.

Grain before and after milling. It was a very fine flour. If I remember, it was white rice.

These are vats of grain waiting to be milled. They have a separate room for the gluten free milling.

It was just pretty cool to see how it all works. We watched stuff being packaged and boxed.

This is the grain Store and cafe. Isn't' it cute!

Water Wheel outside the store.

Millstone and girls

Inside the store. Oh, boy. I fell in love! I plan to go back when it's not so crowded. It was crazy because of the grand opening and then people would come here to buy products and eat. KAT wanted to eat here but it was a little much for all of us. Later when we got home I realized we had a coupon for a free lunch. Oops. Next time. Oh, as we left the grand opening we received a bag of goodies that contained a package of Scottish oatmeal and a package of pancake mix.

Yum-O. Full size packages too!

I'd like to get this cookbook. The store is just really cool.

A hand grinder.

Old mill stones.

Some older milling machinery. You can go online to their website and watch a video tour of the mill.

I'm off to the park now and then to work on the property. TTFN.

With Joy UNquenchable,