Pain-Nature, Roland Feuillas, a producer/miller/baker with a mission

I first found out about Roland Feuillas and his solo gung-ho attempt to bring back ancient grains and restore an ancient windmill to bake breads as close to nature as possible on Azelia’s always-interesting blog. I made a mental note to myself to make a trip to Cucugnan (can you not say that word enough? it’s so cute) when possible. Since then I’ve seen here and there that some épiceries in Paris stock his biscuits and cakes, but it was the bread that I was after. So when I read here that a boulangerie in the 16eme was baking bread with his flours, I rushed down the first chance I got.

Unfortunately the grand épeautre and Kamut loaves are available only on Wednesdays, so I grabbed an anciens blés one, as well as the boulangerie’s signature baguette. A bold bake, roughly formed in a rectangularish shape. I can’t say the crust was particularly delicious, or that there was a sweetness or acidity that seduced—what nailed it was the taste. It was a wheat loaf, but the taste was totally different. A very slight but completely unmistakable difference. Sorry if that sounds confusing. Immediately I wondered what it would like to bake with such a flour…

The only problem was that huge hole. Now, I have no problem with holes. We know how those gelatinized bits are the repository of cool sweetness, but this particular air tunnel was so long, it stretched across five or six slices!! You could peer in and view the stalactites 🙂 The result being that there was a frustrating lack of crumb. Very frustrating indeed when you want to try and recapture that uncommon taste. So i’ll have to trek all the way across town to buy this again. The baguette was also very good, and the other breads certainly looked worth a try.